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HELMET AND SPEAR 



STORIES FROM THE WARS OF 
THE GREEKS AND ROMANS 



By the 

REV. A. J CHURCH, M.A. 

Sometime Professor of Latin in University College, London 
Author of " Stories from Homer," etc. 



" Yea, but of war the righteous last event 
In highest Heaven is born, 
And from great Zeus with saving power is sent." 

Aeschylus, Seven against Thebes. 



NEW YORK 
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

66 Fifth Avenue 
1900 



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IV 



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Flight of the Persians after Marathon. 



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PREFACE 



I HAVE told again in this volume some 
familiar stories, using mostly the original 
authorities, but availing myself, where it was 
possible, of the help of Plutarch, whose bio- 
graphies are always rich in picturesque details. 
These narratives never lose their interest, and 
they have this special significance, that they 
illustrate what we all at least desire to believe, 
that results of abiding good come out of the 
losses and sorrows of war. I have sought to 
draw out this thought with some detail in my 
Epilogue. 

A. J. C. 
Ightham, Sevenoaks. 

September 8, 1900. 



CONTENTS 

BOOK I 
GREECE AND PERSIA. THE DEFENCE 

PAGE 

I. THE MEN OF MARATHONS . . .1 

II. THE LION KING . . . .II 

III. IN THE STRAITS . . . J 21 

IV. THE WOODEN WALLS . . / .29 
V. THE BATTLES ON THE PLAIN AND ON THE 

SHORE. . . . . -44 

BOOK II 

GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

I. THE LORD OF SYRACUSE . . -65 

II. THE STORM FROM AFRICA . . -75 

III. DIONYSIUS THE TYRANT . . -99 

IV. THE DELIVERER FROM CORINTH . . IIO 

BOOK III 

GREECE AND PERSIA. THE ATTACK 

I. THE FIGHT ON THE RIVER . . . I 23 

II. THE IRRESISTIBLE PHALANX . . . 1 35 

III. THE ARMY OF THE HUNDRED PROVINCES . 1 43 

vii 



CONTENTS 



BOOK IV 
ROME AND CARTHAGE 

I. THE SERVANTS OF MARS 

II. FOR THE RULE OF THE SEA 

III. THE MARTYR PATRIOT . 

IV. THE SONS OF LIGHTNING 

V. THE AVALANCHE FROM THE ALPS 

VI. THE DISASTER AT THE LAKE 

VII. THE OVERTHROW AT CANNiE 

VIII. THE SECRET MARCH 

ix. hannibal's last battle 

X. THE BLOTTING OUT OF CARTHAGE 



PAGE 

154 
159 
166 

174 

183 
I94 
202 
213 
224 
232 



BOOK V 
ROME AND THE BARBARIANS. 

I. THE DAY OF ALLIA 

II. APOLLO THE DEFENDER . 

III. THE SWARM FROM THE NORTH 
IV. BEYOND THE PYRENEES . 
V. ACROSS EUPHRATES 
VI. THE CONQUESTS OF CAESAR 
VII. FURTHEST BRITAIN 
VIII. BEYOND THE RHINE 
IX. THE LAST ADVANCE 

BOOK VI 
ROME AND THE BARBARIANS. 
I. A CENTURY OF DISGRACE 

II. A CENTURY OF REVIVAL 

III. THREE DEADLY BLOWS . 
EPILOGUE 



THE RISE 



242 

253 
261 

275 
286 
302 
323 
331 

337 



THE DECLINE 



343 
357 
363 
377 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 

PAGE 

FLIGHT OF THE PERSIANS AFTER MARATHON . Frontispiece 

TIMOLEON HOLDING THE FORD OF THE CRIMESSUS . Il8 

THE BATTLE OF ISSUS . . . . . 140 

THE OVERTHROW OF CANNAE . . . . 2IO 

DEFEAT OF THE CIMBRI IN THE BATTLE AT THE 

WAGGONS . . . . . .272 

CRASSUS DEFEATED BY THE PARTHIANS . . 300 

TRAJAN BESIEGING A DACIAN FORT . . . 340 

ATTILA AND LEO . . . . 374 



MY DAUGHTERS 



BOOK I 
GREECE AND PERSIA. THE DEFENCE 

I. THE MEN OF MARATHON 

WE may say of wars what a famous 
philosopher said of revolutions, that 
they happen about little things, but spring from 
great causes. When Herodotus at the begin- 
ning of his History proceeds to put on 
record the grounds of the great feud between 
the Greeks and the Barbarians, he tells us of 
various outrages committed by one party or 
the other. The Phoenicians began by carry- 
ing off Io, daughter of Inachus ; the Greeks 
' retaliated by landing at Tyre and bearing away 
the king's daughter Europe\ This they 
followed by the capture of Medea, a princess of 
Colchi. When Paris of Troy ran away with 
the fair Helen from Sparta he was only setting 



2 GREECE AND PERSIA 

the account straight. It was then that, accord- 
ing to the Persian sages, with whom Herodotus 
seems to agree, the Greeks made a fatal 
mistake. They actually led a great army into 
Asia to recover a worthless woman, though 
" men of sense care nothing about such people." 
The fact is that the Greeks, as a very enter- 
prising and active race, came into frequent 
collision with their Eastern neighbours. We 
catch glimpses of this in very remote times. 
To these, however, we need not go back. 
Towards the end of the eighth or early in the 
seventh century B.C., the kings of Lydia began 
to encroach on their Greek neighbours and 
conquered city after city. Croesus, who was the 
last of the dynasty, had made himself master of 
all of them before he was himself overthrown 
by Cyrus the Persian. This event meant 
nothing for the Greeks but a change of 
masters, and this was not a change for the 
better. Lydians and Greeks had long been 
neighbours, and could contrive to live on 
tolerable terms. The Persians were strangers 
from a remote country, and were of a harsher 
temper. In 502 B.C. a general rebellion took 
place, in the course of which Sardis, the local 
capital of the Persians, was burnt. A con- 
tingent of Athenian troops took part in this 



THE MEN OF MARATHON 3 

affair, and their presence was the immediate 
cause of the great struggle that followed. The 
war between Greece and Persia lasted, with 
intervals of doubtful peace, something less than 
180 years. The first great conflict was at 
Marathon. 

In the late summer of 490 B.C. the Persian 
army landed at the Bay of Marathon, distant 
from Athens about twenty miles as the crow 
flies, about twenty-five by the only road 
practicable for wheeled conveyances. Of the 
Persian numbers we know nothing. Herodotus, 
who is our best authority (born in 480, he pro- 
bably talked with men who had fought in the 
battle), gives no figures. Later writers speak 
of impossible numbers, 600,000 being the largest, 
110,000 the smallest estimate. To carry even 
1 10,000 across the yEgean sea would have been 
a heavy task. If a guess has to be made, one 
may venture to say 60,000. The Athenians 
numbered 10,000, and they had with them 
1,000 men from Plataea, a little Boeotian town, 
which they had recently taken under their 
protection. The Plain of Marathon is about 
six miles long from south-west to north-east, and 
in breadth varies from two and a half to one 
and a-half miles. On the north-east it is bounded 
by a great marsh, which is divided from the 



4 GREECE AND PERSIA 

sea by a narrow slip of land. There is another 
smaller marsh on the south-west. Along the 
edge of this swamp ran the road to Athens. It 
was probably the immediate object of Datis, the 
Persian general, to seize this road, and of the 
Athenian commanders to protect it. Their 
right wing rested on the seaward slope of what 
is now called Agrieliki, the north-eastern spur 
of Pentelicus. About a mile from this may still 
be seen the remains of the mound which was 
raised over the bones of the Athenians slain 
in the battle. It is probable that this marks 
the spot where the fight raged most fiercely. 
If this is so, the Persian lines must have been 
advanced to within a short distance of the rising 
ground. 

The Athenians, on learning the actual 
approach of the Persian forces, had sent a 
swift runner to Sparta to beg for help. The 
man reached Sparta, a distance of about one 
hundred and forty miles, in less than forty-eight 
hours ("on the second day" is the expression). 
The Spartans promised to come, but could not 
start, they said, till after the full moon, which 
was then five days off. The question then 
among the Athenian generals — there were ten 
in number and had each his day of command — 
was whether they should fight at once or wait 



THE MEN OF MARATHON 5 

for the Spartan contingent. The ten generals 
who shared the command of the army were 
equally divided in opinion. But Miltiades, the 
most distinguished of their number, was eager 
for instant action, and succeeded in winning 
over to his views Callimachus the Polemarch, 
with whom it lay, in case of an equal division, 
to give the casting vote. We shall see that he 
had good reasons for his action, and that his 
promptitude saved Athens ; and, we may say, 
Greece. 

The centre of the Persian line of battle was 
held by the native Persians and Sacse, these 
latter a tribe now represented by the Tur- 
comans. Of the rest of the formation we are 
told nothing. Some cavalry they had, but it is 
not mentioned as taking any part in the battle. 
It has been conjectured that it had not been 
disembarked when the battle was fought. It 
would certainly have been difficult to get the 
horses on board again, and if any number of 
them had been captured, we should probably 
have heard something about it. The Athenian 
line was drawn up so as to be equal in length 
to the Persian. To effect this it was, of course, 
necessary to make it very thin in parts. This 
was the case in the centre, where there 
were but two or three files. No light armed 



6 GREECE AND PERSIA 

soldiers, no archers, no cavalry were present. 
All were heavy armed men with a few slaves 
in attendance. The right wing was com- 
manded by Callimachus ; the Plataeans were on 
the left. 

There was, as has been said, a space of 
a mile between the two armies. Miltiades 
ordered the Athenians to cross this at a run. 
Such a thing had never been done before in 
regular warfare. It was an amazing feat of 
strength, for the men were in heavy armour. 
Not less remarkable was the courage of the 
movement, for in those days the Greeks had 
not learned to look down upon the Persians. 
To the enemy the charge seemed to be the act 
of madmen ; but they must have felt that such 
madmen were dangerous enemies, and must 
have been shaken in the confidence with which 
they had looked forward to victory. Still they 
stood their ground, and met their assailants 
in hand-to-hand fight. They even broke the 
centre of the Athenian line, which, as has been 
said, was but two or three files deep. Herodotus 
even says that "they pursued them into the 
middle country," a curious phrase, seeing that 
the battle was fought only a mile or so from the 
sea shore. But in hand-to-hand fighting, when 
the conditions were at all equal, the Persians 



THE MEN OF MARATHON 7 

were no match, either in training or in equip- 
ment, for their adversaries. The poet 
^Eschylus, himself " a man of Marathon," the 
proudest title which an Athenian could bear, 
speaks of the war of the Persian against the 
Greek as the battle of the bow against the 
spear. In the Perscg, the drama which cele- 
brates the crushing defeat of Persia in its 
second assault on Greece, he makes the chorus, 
consisting of the Great King's councillors, boast 
of how their lord would bid 

" The arrows' iron hail advance 
Against the cumbrous moving lance ; " 

a happy stroke of irony when it was known 
that the lance had prevailed over the arrow. 
It certainly prevailed that day. Both the wings 
were victorious in the shock of arms, and when 
they had put to flight the ranks opposed to 
them they turned to restore the fortune of the 
day in the centre. This they soon accom- 
plished. Before long the whole Persian line 
was in rapid retreat. Pausanias says that 
many of the fugitives rushed into the marsh, 
and, indeed, that the greater part of their loss 
was thus caused. 

Miltiades, anxious to complete his victory, 
followed up the flying enemy, and endeavoured 



8 GREECE AND PERSIA 

to cut off his retreat. Here he was less suc- 
cessful, and, indeed, incurred serious loss. In 
the attempt to burn the Persian ships not a 
few distinguished Athenians fell. The Pole- 
march and another of the generals were among 
them ; so was a brother of the poet ^Eschylus, 
who, having laid hold of one of the ships, had 
his hand cut off by an axe, and died of the 
wound. The Persians contrived to get away, 
not losing more than seven of their ships, but 
leaving behind them in their richly furnished 
tents an ample booty for the conquerors. 

Athens, however, was not yet safe. Hippias, 
who along with his brother had once held 
despotic power in the city, and had been 
driven into exile twenty years before, had 
come with the Persian army, hoping that his 
friends — for he still had a party that plotted for 
his return — would move in his favour. They 
did not altogether fail him. When the Persians 
had re-embarked, a signal — a polished shield 
flashing in the sunlight — was perceived on the 
summit of Pentelicus. This was to indicate 
that the Persians should take advantage of the 
absence of the army and sail round to Athens, 
and that the party of Hippias was ready to act. 
Part of the fleet accordingly took the direction 
of Cape Sunium, which it would have to round 






THE MEN OF MARATHON 9 

before it could reach Athens. Miltiades seems 
to have been aware of what was intended, and 
at once gave orders to march back to Athens 
with all haste. This was done, and the traitors 
were foiled. The Persian fleet, it will be seen 
from the map, would have to make a circuit of 
about sixty miles, while the army would have 
to march less than half that distance. 

The Persian loss is put down by Herodotus 
at 6,200, a moderate figure which is very pro- 
bably near the truth. Of the Athenians, one 
hundred and ninety-two were slain. They were 
buried on the field of battle, and a mound 
heaped over their remains. On the top of 
this were placed ten stone pillars, one for each 
of the Athenian tribes, inscribed with the names 
of the slain. An eleventh pillar commemorated 
the Platseans, a twelfth the slaves who fell 
in the great victory. After the death of 
Miltiades a monument was erected to him on 
the same spot. The pillars have long since 
perished, but the mound remains. It is thirty 
feet high and about 200 yards in circumference. 
It was excavated in 1890-91 by order of 
the Greek Government, and found to contain 
human remains, with pottery of the very period 
of the battle. Writing about six centuries 
later, Pausanias says, " Here every night you 



io GREECE AND PERSIA 

may hear horses neighing and men fighting," 
and adds that it brings bad luck to go out of 
curiosity, but that " with him who unwittingly 
lights upon it by accident the spirits are not 
angry." The same tradition lingers about many 
of the great battlefields of the world. Shep- 
herds who fed their flocks on the plains of 
Troy saw spectres in armour, and conspicuous 
among them the spirit of the great Achilles. 
The scenes of the great battles of Attila and 
Charlemagne are still said to be thus haunted. 
It only remains to say that 2,000 Spartans 
arrived on the day after the battle, that they 
went to the field of battle to see the Persian 
dead, and after greatly praising the Athenians, 
returned home. 



II 



THE LION KING 



DARIUS was not by any means disposed 
to take his repulse at Marathon as final. 
On the contrary, he at once set to work on 
making preparations for a new expedition, 
which should this time be one of overwhelming 
force, and which he determined to lead in 
person. A revolt which broke out in Egypt 
probably delayed him for a time. Anyhow, 
he died in 485 before his preparations were 
complete. He had reigned for thirty-six years 
and was probably in his sixty-eighth year. 
Xerxes, the eldest of the sons born after his 
accession to the throne, succeeded him without 
any opposition. He is said to have been 
averse to the scheme of an invasion, but was 
persuaded by those who were interested in 
promoting it. However this may be, the 
preparations were not seriously interrupted. 



12 GREECE AND PERSIA 

The Egyptian insurrection was put down, and 
in the autumn of 481 the army intended for 
the invasion of Greece was assembled at 
Sardis. The story of the events that followed 
must be sought elsewhere, for I am not 
attempting to give a narrative of the Persian 
war. It must suffice to say that by August, 
490, the Persian army had occupied Thessaly. 
It was at the famous pass which leads from 
this region into Locris that the Greeks made 
their first stand. 

Thermopylae (the Hot Gates) consisted of 
two narrow passes, neither of them of greater 
width than one wheeled carriage would require, 
caused by the near approach of Mount CEta 
to the sea, or rather to an impassable morass 
which here formed the coast-line. (It is well 
to remark that considerable changes have taken 
place in the character of the country, the coast- 
line, in particular, having receded a long way 
eastward.) The easternmost of the two passes 
was that to which the name properly belonged, 
for here there were actual hot springs, dedicated 
to Hercules, and supplying medicinal baths. 
Between the two passes (the distance of a 
mile) the mountain receded from the sea, 
leaving a level space of about half a mile 
broad. At Thermopylae proper there was a 



THE LION KING 13 

wall built by the Locrians, but at the time of 
which we are speaking it had fallen into ruins. 

It was here that Leonidas, one of the two 
kings of Sparta, took up his position, late, it 
would seem, in July. He had with him 300 
Spartans, 2,500 soldiers from other parts of 
the Peloponnesus, a contingent of 700 from 
Thespiae, one of the Boeotian towns, which 
dissented strongly from the pro- Persian views 
of their countrymen, and 400 Thebans, who 
came on compulsion. Thebes did not venture 
to refuse the demands of Leonidas while their 
Persian friends were still a long way off. He 
was also joined by contingents of the Locrians 
and Phocians. Both tribes had given in or 
were about to give in their submission to the 
Persians, but probably preferred the success of 
the Greeks. In any case, they were not pre- 
pared to resist the Greek commander-in-chief, 
present as he was with a much superior 
force. 

Leonidas at once strengthened his position 
by repairing the half-ruined wall by the Hot 
Springs. But he learnt that Thermopylae 
was not the only way by which access could 
be had from northern to southern Greece. 
The Phocians informed him that there was a 
mountain path which led from a point beyond 



14 GREECE AND PERSIA 

the westernmost pass to another point beyond 
the defile of the Hot Springs. But they 
promised that they would guard it. The fact 
came, of course, to the knowledge of the troops 
generally, and greatly discouraged them. They 
even wished to abandon Thermopylae alto- 
gether. Those that came from the Peloponnese 
were especially urgent, believing that they 
had a much better position for defence in 
the Isthmus of Corinth. Leonidas refused to 
retreat, but he sent messengers to the various 
Greek States with an urgent demand for re- 
inforcements. The forces that he had with 
him were wholly unequal, he said, to cope with 
such an army as the Persians had at their 
command. 

Xerxes, who had encamped within sight of 
Thermopylae, sent a horseman to reconnoitre 
the position of Leonidas. The Spartans were 
on guard that day in front of the wall, and 
the man observed that some were engaged 
in athletic exercises, while others were combing 
their long hair. Demaratus, an exiled king of 
Sparta, who was with Xerxes, when questioned 
about the meaning of this behaviour, told him 
that his countrymen were particularly careful 
with their toilet when engaged in any dangerous 
enterprise, and that he must expect a desperate 



THE LION KING 15 

resistance. "You have to deal," he went on, 
" with the first city of Greece, and with her 
bravest men." " But how can so small a 
company contend with mine," asked Xerxes, 
who had not yet learnt to doubt his big 
battalions. The king was unwilling to believe 
him, and waited for four days in the expecta- 
tion that the Greeks would think better of 
their purpose to resist, and would retire without 
a conflict. 

On the fifth day, finding that the Greeks 
were still in their positions, Xerxes sent the 
Medes and the men of Cissia (now Khuzistan) 
with instructions to take the Greeks alive and 
bring them into his presence. These troops 
rushed with the greatest courage to the attack. 
Many were slain, for indeed they were no 
match for the Greeks in hand-to-hand fighting, 
but others stepped into their places. The 
struggle went on during the whole day, with 
no result except heavy loss to the assailants. 
On the morrow Xerxes sent his Persian corps 
d'dlite, which went by the name of the "Im- 
mortals," to the attack, confident that they 
would be able to force the pass. They met 
with no better success. Their spears were 
shorter than those used by the Greeks, and the 
narrowness of the battlefield did not allow 



1 6 GREECE AND PERSIA 

them to take advantage of their superiority in 
numbers. Herodotus makes special mention 
of the practised skill which the Spartans dis- 
played. One of their methods was to feign 
flight, lure the assailants on, and then turn on 
them with deadly effect. Vast numbers of the 
Persians were slain ; the Greeks also suffered 
some loss, for the best troops of the East could 
not have fought wholly in vain, but this loss 
was very small. Thrice during the day's en- 
gagement the Persian king is said to have 
leapt from the seat from which he watched the 
combat in terror for his army. 

Yet another day was spent in a fruitless 
assault on the Greek position. The Persians 
hoped to wear out the enemy by incessant 
attacks. Some must be slain or wounded, and 
when the total number was so small, even a 
small loss must tell upon them in the end. As 
a matter of fact, however, the strength of the 
Greeks was not sensibly impaired. The space 
of ground that had to be held was very small, 
and the Greeks could change their men actually 
engaged at frequent intervals. 

The treachery of a native of Malis, a little 
Dorian state in the heart of the mountains, 
relieved Xerxes of his perplexity. He offered, 
for a reward, to show a mountain path by which 



THE LION KING 17 

the Greek position could be turned. The 
name of this wretch, on whose head a price 
was set by the General Council of the Greek 
States, was Ephialtes. It is doubtful whether 
the secret could have been long kept ; but 
there seems to have been a general agreement 
that Ephialtes was the guilty man, though 
other names were mentioned. 

Xerxes willingly purchased the secret, and 
entrusted the task of outflanking the Greek 
position to the Immortals. They started at 
dusk and marched all night. The Phocian 
guards of the path seem to have neglected to 
place any outposts, and were not aware of the 
approach of the enemy till the crackling of the 
leaves under their feet, carried through the 
still air of night, gave them warning. They 
started up from their bivouack at the sound, 
and the Persians, surprised at the sight of an 
enemy whose presence they had not expected, 
halted. The Phocians seem not to have 
attempted to hold the path, but retreated to 
the crest of the hill and then made ready to 
defend themselves. The Persians left them 
alone, and continued their march. 

The Greeks at Thermopylae had by this 
time received warning of what had happened. 
The soothsayer attached to the force is said 

3 



18 GREECE AND PERSIA 






to have read in the victims which he examined 
a prognostic of their fate. More definite in- 
formation came from scouts who had been out 
on the hills, and who now came hurrying into 
the camp with the news. A council of war 
was hastily held. It could not agree, but the 
result was that the majority of the contingents 
retreated. Whether they did this with or with- 
out the orders of Leonidas is not certain. It 
is one of the matters about which it is almost 
impossible to arrive at the truth. Herodotus 
thinks that they were ordered to retire by 
Leonidas because he saw that they were un- 
willing to stay. This has a look of probability. 
As for Leonidas himself and his Spartans, they 
elected to stay. The inflexible military honour 
of their commonwealth forbade retreat. The 
seven hundred Thespians refused to depart, and 
must be allowed the glory of a still more heroic 
courage. r The Theban contingent was detained 
against its will. The soothsayer Megistias— his 
name ought to be preserved no less carefully than 

1 Canon Rawlinson does not show himself as acute as 
usual when he suggests that this splendid resolve of the 
Thespians was due to an ambition of dispossessing Thebes 
from the headship of the Boeotian confederacy. Mr. Grote's 
remark that they knew that they must be left homeless is 
more to the point. 



THE LION KING 19 

that of the traitor Ephialtes — refused to depart, 
though being not a Spartan, but an Acamanian 
by birth, he might have done so without dis- 
credit, but he sent away his only son. The 
name of the Thespian leader ought also to 
have its place on the roll of honour. It was 
Demophilus. 

In the forenoon the Persians began a double 
attack, in front and in rear. They had seen 
such proofs of Greek prowess that the men had 
to be driven into battle by the whip. As for 
the Greeks, they changed their tactics. Leaving 
the pass of the Hot Springs and the wall, they 
advanced into the open space. Hope of escape 
or victory had been given up. They would 
fight where they could sell their lives most 
dearly. And dearly did they sell them. Crowds 
of the Persians fell ; many were trampled under 
foot by their comrades ; many more were thrust 
into the marsh that bordered the road on the 
side of the sea. Among the slain were two 
brothers of the king. The Spartans and 
Thespians fought till their spears were broken. 
Leonidas seems to have fallen early in the day, 
and there was a furious struggle for the posses- 
sion of his body. Four times did the bar- 
barians carry it off, and four times was it 
recovered. As the day drew on the Immortals 



20 GREECE AND PERSIA 

came upon the scene. Aware of their approach, 
the Greeks retreated to the pass and prolonged 
their resistance to the very uttermost. When 
their weapons failed them they used their 
hands and even their teeth. Buc the Persians 
now surrounded them and showered arrows 
and all kinds of missiles upon them. They 
perished to a man. One more name from 
among the three hundred Spartans must be 
preserved — Dieneces, who seems to have been 
a wit as well as a warrior. When a man of 
Trachis told him that the Persians were so 
numerous that their arrows would darken the 
sun, " 'Tis well," he replied, "stranger; then 
we shall fight in the shade." One of the con- 
tingent was absent. He and a comrade had 
been lying sick of ophthalmia at a neigh- 
bouring village. They could not agree as 
to what should be done. One buckled on 
his armour and bade his attendant helot lead 
him — for he could not see — to the battlefield. 
The helot did so, and then turned and fled. 
His master plunged into the thick of the fight 
and fell. The other sick man returned to 
Sparta. There no one would give him light 
to kindle his fire, or speak to him. He wiped 
away the reproach by falling, after prodigies of 
valour, at Plataea. 



Ill 



IN THE STRAITS 



WHILE the army of the allied Greeks 
was holding the pass of Thermopylae, 
their fleet occupied Artemisium. This was a 
promontory at the northern end of the island of 
Eubcea, a small stretch of coast on either side 
of the actual cape being known by the same 
name. The Persian attack was being made 
both by land and sea, and the Greek plan of 
defence was to check it at two points which 
were as nearly as possible in a line. 

Both positions were liable to be turned. 
The danger at Artemisium was even greater 
than at Thermopylae, for there was nothing to 
prevent the Persian fleet from sailing down the 
east coast of Eubcea. Indeed we shall see that 
this was done, though, as it turned out, without 
any ill result to the Greeks. It is clear that 
the officers in command of the fleet were quite 



22 



GREECE AND PERSIA 



as uneasy as some of the army leaders at 
Thermopylae, nor was there any one who 
could exercise the control that Leonidas, in 
virtue of his commanding personality and his 
rank as a Spartan king, exercised over the 
allies. 

An event of no great importance turned this 
uneasiness into panic. Two out of three ships 
which had been detached to keep a look out 
were captured by an advanced Persian squadron 
of ten ships. In consequence of this disaster, 
the fleet hastily retreated some fifty miles to 
the south to a spot where the channel between 
the mainland and Eubcea is at its narrowest. 
It would probably have gone still further south 
but for the heavy loss which the Persian fleet 
suffered during a four days' storm. No less 
than four hundred ships were destroyed, and 
with them an uncounted multitude of men. 
The Greeks were so encouraged by the loss 
which had befallen the enemy, that they re- 
turned in all haste and took up their former 
station. Hence the battle of Artemisium. 

The first incident was a Greek success. The 
Persian fleet took up its position in the great 
natural harbour which is now known as the 
Gulf of Volo. Fifteen ships belonging to it 
lagged so far behind the rest, that by the time 



IN THE STRAITS 23 

they reached the south-eastern point of the 
gulf the main body had rounded it and were 
out of sight. But the Greek fleet was full in 
view ; they mistook it for their own, sailed 
straight towards it, and were captured without 
a struggle. Notwithstanding this stroke of 
good fortune the Greek captains were full of 
fears. Even after the losses caused by the 
storm, the Persian fleet greatly outnumbered 
their own. They had two hundred and eighty 
ships, reckoning nine fifty-oars with the larger 
triremes or " three-bankers " ; the Persians 
must have had more than twice as many. The 
question of retreat again came up, and seemed 
very likely to be decided in the affirmative. A 
different result was brought about by a pro- 
ceeding curiously characteristic of Greek ways 
of acting and thinking. The people of Eubcea 
were in despair at the prospect of being deserted. 
It would be something, they thought, if they 
could secure a few days' grace in which to 
remove their portable property to a place of 
safety. They went to Eurybiades, the Spartan 
admiral, who was in supreme command, and 
begged him to postpone his departure for a 
short time. He refused the request. It would 
not, he said, be for the public interest. Then 
they went to Themistocles, the Athenian 



2 4 



GREECE AND PERSIA 



admiral. He was not the commander-in-chief, 
but he commanded the most numerous con- 
tingent, one hundred and twenty-seven ships, 
only thirteen short of the half. They offered 
him a splendid bribe of thirty talents (about 
,£7,000 of our money) if he could procure for 
them the desired delay. Themistocles seems 
to have known the price of the men whom he 
had to buy. To Eurybiades he gave five 
talents, and the Spartan, to whom this sum 
probably seemed a fortune, changed his views 
about the public safety. The Corinthian 
commander, who had the most powerful 
squadron after that of Athens, had also to be 
bought. Themistocles dealt with him in the 
frankest way. " I will give you," he said, 
" more for staying than the Persians will give 
you for going." The Corinthian does not seem 
to have resented the suggestion that he was 
ready to be bribed by the enemies of his 
country, and accepted the two talents which 
Themistocles sent on board his ship. The 
Athenian kept the handsome balance in his 
own hands. We cannot say anything more 
for him than that he comes out of the transac- 
tion better than his colleagues. They believed 
that the better and safer course was to retreat. 
He, on the contrary, was convinced that the 



IN THE STRAITS 25 

right policy was to stop and fight. But he 
never forgot his personal interests. In this 
case he made them harmonise ; on other 
occasions his action was more doubtful. There 
is reason to think that, before the end of his 
career, he postponed the public good to his own. 
The Persians, when they saw that the Greek 
fleet was still at Artemisium, had, it would 
seem, no thought but of how they might make 
sure of capturing the whole. They sent a 
squadron of two hundred ships to sail down 
the eastern coast of Eubcea. These were to 
take the Greek in the rear, the main body 
waiting till the arrival of the squadron had 
been signalled. Meanwhile the Greeks had 
received some encouraging intelligence. A 
Greek diver, named Scyllias, 1 who had been in 

1 Pausanias tells us that he saw at Delphi a statue of this 
Scyllias, which had been erected by the Amphictyonic 
Council. A statue of his daughter Hydna had formerly 
stood next to it, but had been carried off by Nero. The 
two were famous divers, and some marvellous legends had 
gathered about them. Pausanias was told that they had 
dragged away the anchors and moorings of the Persian 
ships during the storm, and so aggravated the disaster. 
Herodotus had heard a yet more marvellous story of how 
Scyllias had dived the whole distance, nearly ten miles, 
between the Persian station and the Greek, but adds 
characteristically, " My own opinion is that he made the 
passage in a boat." 



26 GREECE AND PERSIA 

the employ of the Persians, deserted to them. 
He described the damage that had been done 
by the storm, and also informed them about 
the squadron that had been sent round Eubcea. 
The first thought of the Greek admirals was to 
sail south, and meet this squadron. But on 
reflection, bolder counsels prevailed. Late in 
the afternoon they left their station, and sailed 
towards the hostile fleet. The Persians viewed 
the movement with astonishment, and the 
Asiatic Greeks with dismay, for though serving 
with the enemy, they wished well to their 
countrymen. The Greek ships were inferior, 
not only in numbers, but also in equipment, 
and they seemed to be rushing on destruction. 
The Greeks began by assuming what seemed 
like a defensive position, forming a circle, with 
the sterns of their ships in close order, and the 
prows turned to the enemy. The enemy ad- 
vanced to close with them, and then, at a 
concerted signal, the Greeks dashed at their 
opponents with such success that they captured 
thirty of their ships, the first prize falling, as 
indeed was fitting, to an Athenian ship. The 
Persians, recovered from the first surprise, 
began to hold their own better, and when night 
fell, the issue of the conflict was still doubtful. 
The captain of a ship from the island of 



IN THE STRAITS 27 

Lemnos had the sagacity to see how the 
struggle would end, and deserted to the Greeks, 
receiving afterwards a handsome reward for his 
timely patriotism. 

Again the " stars fought in their courses for 
Greece." That night there was a thunder- 
storm, with heavy rain and wind. The main 
body of the fleet did not suffer much material 
damage, but the crews were dismayed to see 
fragments of wrecks and bodies of the dead 
drifted in by the wind. These were, indeed, 
the tokens of a great disaster. The squadron 
that was sent round Eubcea had been driven 
on a lee shore and absolutely destroyed. On 
the morrow the Persians made no movement, 
but the Greeks repeated the tactics of the day 
before. The news of the disaster to the 
Persian squadron had reached them, and they 
had been joined by a reinforcement of Athenian 
ships. This gave them new courage besides 
increasing their strength. Before the close of 
the day they captured some Cilician ships. 

On the third day the Persian commanders, 
made desperate by failure, for they served a 
master who exacted a cruel penalty for ill- 
success, moved forward to engage the enemy, 
the Greeks awaiting their attack. The order 
of the Persian attack was in the shape of a 




28 GREECE AND PERSIA 

half-moon, and its object to outflank the enemy 
on either side. The Greeks accepted the 
challenge. The result was not decisive. The 
Greeks sunk and captured more ships than 
they themselves lost. But their own loss was 
serious. Of the Athenian fleet especially, more 
than half was so injured as to require repair. 
By this time, too, the position had ceased 
to have any strategic value. The pass of 
Thermopylae had been forced by the Persians, 
and it was useless, therefore, to hold Artemisium. 
That night the Greek fleet retired southwards. 
Themistocles, before he went, caused to be 
engraved on a prominent rock an inscription 
which invited the Asiatic Greeks serving with 
the Persians to make common cause with their 
countrymen. "If these words," he reasoned 
with himself, "escape the knowledge of the 
king, they may bring these Greeks over to us ; 
if they come to his knowledge, they will make 
him distrust them." 






IV 



THE WOODEN WALLS 



THE retreat of the Greek forces from 
Thermopylae and Artemisium left 
Athens without defence. There had been a 
promise that an army of the allies should 
make a stand against the invaders in Bceotia. 
No attempt was made to keep it. The only 
plan of defence that commended itself to the 
Peloponnesian States was to fortify the Isthmus 
of Corinth — and all the states outside the 
Peloponnesus, Athens excepted, were either 
pro- Persian or indifferent. As Athens was 
unwalled, there was no question of defending 
it ; the only thing that could be done was 
to save as much life and property as was 
possible. For this the time was short, and 
might have been shorter than it actually was, 
for the Athenians had six days in which to 
transport their belongings to a place of safety, 



30 GREECE AND PERSIA 

though the distance to be traversed by the in- 
vaders was not more than ninety miles. All 
the women, children, and persons incapacitated 
by illness or old age were put on shipboard, 
and carried either to Trcezen, a friendly city 
in the peninsula of Argolis, which had some 
tie of kinship with Athens, to ^Egina, which 
was but ten miles away, or to Salamis, which 
was even nearer. The Athenians begged the 
allies to remain in the neighbourhood till the 
work of transport was accomplished, and 
Salamis happened to be the most convenient 
spot for this purpose. 

The whole fighting strength of Athens was 
now embarked in its fleet. Years before, 
Themistocles, with a sagacity and prescience 
that seem almost miraculous, had counselled 
his countrymen to spend all their available 
resources in building ships. And only a few 
months before, the oracle of Delphi had advised 
the Athenians to trust in their " wooden wall," 
a phrase which this same statesman had in- 
terpreted as meaning the ships. No one, we 
may believe, knew better what it meant, as 
he had probably suggested it. The time had 
now come to put this counsel into practice. 
Every able-bodied Athenian took service in 
the fleet, the wealthy aristocrats, known as the 



THE WOODEN WALLS 31 

"knights," setting the examples by hanging 
up their bridles in the temple of Athene. 

It had never been the intention of the 
officers in command of the allied fleet to give 
battle at Salamis. They thought of nothing 
but the safety of the Peloponnesus ; possibly 
they believed that nothing more than this 
could be hoped for. But when the Athenians, 
compelled as they were to abandon their city, 
asked for their help in saving non-combatants 
and such property as could be removed, they 
could not refuse. And now the question 
presented itself — Where are we to meet the 
Persian fleet? The captains assembled in the 
ship of Eurybiades the Spartan, who was in 
chief command, and debated on what was to 
be done. The general opinion was that they 
should retire from Salamis, from which there 
would be great difficulty in escaping, if escape 
should become necessary, and give battle some- 
where off the coast of the Peloponnesus. In 
the midst of the discussion a messenger arrived 
with the news that the Persians had overrun 
all Attica, and had taken by storm the citadel 
of Athens, which a few enthusiasts had insisted 
on defending. These tidings could not have 
taken any one by surprise, but the fact that 
one of the great cities of Greece had fallen 



32 GREECE AND PERSIA 

into the hands of the barbarians produced a 
panic. Some of the captains left without 
waiting for the decision of the council, and, 
hurrying to their own squadrons, prepared 
to depart. Those who stayed resolved to 
retire to the Isthmus and make a stand 
there. 

As Themistocles was returning to his ship 
from the council, he was met by a friend who, 
in bygone years, had been his instructor in 
philosophy. The new-comer, on hearing the 
decision at which the council had arrived, 
denounced it most emphatically. " It means 
ruin for Greece," he said. " The fleet will 
not remain together to fight ; every contingent 
will steal away, hoping to protect its own 
country. Go and persuade Eurybiades to 
reconsider the question." 

Themistocles went, and using every argu- 
ment that he could think of, at last succeeded 
in making such an impression on Eurybiades 
that he consented to summon another council. 
Of course it was the etiquette for the com- 
mander-in-chief to state the business which 
they had met to discuss, but Themistocles, 
who saw that it was a matter of life and 
death, could not help urging his case, without 
waiting for the president of the council. 



THE WOODEN WALLS 33 

Adeimantus, of Corinth, angrily interrupted 
him. " Themistocles," he said, "at the 
Games, they who start too soon are scourged." 
"True," replied the Athenian, "but they who 
start too late are not crowned." He then 
addressed the council in a tone of studied 
mildness and conciliation. He said nothing 
about the probability that the fleet would be 
broken up by a general desertion — such an 
argument would have been affront — but he 
urged that to fight at Salamis would not be 
to risk everything on the issue of one battle. 
To retreat would be to leave all northern 
Greece at the mercy of the Persians, while 
a defeat at the Isthmus would mean the loss 
of the Peloponnesus itself. As for the 
Athenians, they would loyally abide by any 
decision to which the allies might come. 

Adeimantus, enraged at the Athenian's per- 
sistence, interrupted him with the remark that 
a man who had no country had no right to 
speak, and even appealed to Eurybiades to 
impose silence upon him. Themistocles then 
saw that it was time to assert himself. " With 
two hundred ships fully manned and armed we 
have," he said, turning to Adeimantus, "as 
good a country as any man here, for what 
s\ate could resist us should we choose to attack 

4 



34 GREECE AND PERSIA 

it ? " Then he addressed himself to Eury- 
biades, " Play the man and all will be well. 
All depends upon our ships. If you will not 
stay here and fight, we will take our families 
on board and sail for Italy, where the gods 
have provided us a home. Without us, what 
will you do ? " 

To this threat there was no answer. The 
council resolved to stay and fight. 

But the matter was not really settled. The 
Peloponnesian contingents were determined, 
in the last resort, to disobey their chief, and 
Themistocles was aware of their determination. 
Only one course remained for him, and it 
required the courage of despair to take it. 
If the allies would not stay at Salamis of their 
own free will, they must do it by compulsion. 
He sent a trusted slave to the Persian admiral 
with this message : " The Athenian commander 
is a well-wisher to the King, and he informs 
you that the Greeks are seized with fear, and 
are about to retreat from Salamis. It is for 
you to hinder their flight." A more daring 
stratagem was never put into execution. Not 
the least strange circumstance about it is the 
fact that, years after, when Themistocles had 
fallen into disgrace at home, he successfully 
claimed as a service to the Persian king that 



THE WOODEN WALLS 35 

he had given him the chance of destroying the 
whole of the Greek fleet at one blow. 

The Persian commanders seem not to have 
suspected the good faith of the communication 
thus received, and at once set about closing 
in the Greek ships. The town of Salamis was 
built in a little bay on the eastern side of the 
island, the distance across to the mainland of 
Attica being about two miles. The Greek 
fleet was drawn up, in what may be described 
as the shape of a bow loosely strung, in front 
of the town ; the Persian ships were ranged 
along the opposite, i.e., the Attic shore. Both 
to the north and to the south the channel 
narrowed, being less than a mile across. The 
Persians now extended their line northwards 
till it touched the shore of the island, and 
southwards till it reached an uninhabited island 
called Psyttaleia. On this island they landed 
a body of troops who were to help the crews 
of any of their own ships that might be 
damaged, and slaughter any Greek soldiers or 
sailors who might be in a similar plight. 

While these preparations were going on — 
and they lasted nearly through the night — 
the Greek leaders still hotly debated the 
question of going or staying. An unexpected 
end was put to the controversy. The chief 



36 GREECE AND PERSIA 

opponent of Themistocles in Athenian politics 
was Aristides. He had been banished, and, 
at the instance of his successful rival, recalled 
from banishment when the danger of a Persian 
invasion became imminent. He now came 
to join his countrymen, and brought startling 
tidings with him. He had come from the 
island of ^Egina, which lay some twelve miles 
to the south of Salamis, and his ship had 
narrowly escaped capture in making its way 
into the bay of Salamis ; only the darkness 
had made it possible to do so. Themistocles 
was fetched out from the council to hear the 
tidings. " I hope," said Aristides, " that 
always, and now especially, our strife will be 
who may do his best service to his country. 
As for the question of going or staying, it 
matters nothing whether the Peloponnesians 
talk much or little. Go they cannot. We are 
enclosed on every side. This I have seen 
with my own eyes." 

" This is good news," replied Themistocles, 
" for the Persians have done exactly what I 
wished. Our men, who would not fight of their 
own free will, will now be made to fight." 
And he told him of what he had done. " And 
now go and tell them. If I was to say it, 
they would not believe me." 



THE WOODEN WALLS 37 

Aristides accordingly went in to the council 
and told them his news. Many of them refused 
to believe it, but when a ship from the island 
of Tenos that had deserted from the Persians 
confirmed the report, there was nothing more 
to say. All that could be done was to make 
all the preparation possible for a conflict which 
had become inevitable. 

Of the battle we have two accounts, that 
of Herodotus, derived doubtless from one or 
more persons who had taken part in it, and 
that of ^Eschylus, who actually fought there 
as he had fought before at Marathon. The 
two accounts substantially agree, but they 
differ in the number of Greek ships engaged. 
Herodotus says that there were 378, made 
up to the round number of 380 by the Tenian 
ship which deserted on the night before the 
battle, and a ship from Lemnos, which had 
done the same at Artemisium. He gives the 
number of each contingent, the largest being 
180 contributed by Athens, while 89 came 
from the states of the Peloponnesus, and 
57 from ^Egina and Eubcea. One ship only 
came from Greece beyond the sea. Even this 
was a private rather than a public contribution. 
A certain Phayllus of Crotona furnished a ship 
at his own expense, and manned it with fellow- 



38 



GREECE AND PERSIA 



citizens who were sojourning in Greece. 
Pausanias saw his statue at Delphi six centuries 
afterwards. yEschylus says that there were 
300 ships, and ten were of special swiftness 
or strength. Mr. Grote thinks that this 
number is to be accepted in preference, hardly 
showing, I think, his wonted acuteness. The 
poet had to state his number in verse, and 
finds "ten thirties" a convenient way of doing 
it. But 380 would have been an unmanageable 
figure, and we have, accordingly, a convenient 
round number. Very likely Mr. Grote was 
not so alive to the exigencies of verse as he 
had been forty years before, when he was a 
Charterhouse boy. 

As soon as the sun rose, the Greek fleet 
moved forward to the attack, the crews joining, 
as they advanced, in the pcean or shout of 
battle. They met no reluctant foe. So confi- 
dent, indeed, was the bearing of the Persians, 
that the Greeks were checked. Some of the 
crews even began to back water. The issues 
of great battles are often decided by examples 
of courage. So it was at Salamis, for one of 
the Greek ships advanced and led the way for 
the rest. To whom this credit is due cannot be 
said for certain. The Athenians declared that 
this brave captain was Ameinias, a brother of 



THE WOODEN WALLS 39 

the poet ^Eschylus ; the ^ginetans claimed 
the honour for a ship of their own, which had 
brought over, on the eve of the battle, the 
heroes worshipped in their city as auxiliaries 
of the Greek people. 1 Herodotus had also 
heard a legend how the form of a woman, 
doubtless the goddess Athene, had been seen 
in the air and heard to cry, in a voice which 
reached from one end of the fleet to another, 
" Friends, how much further are ye going to 
back ? " ^schylus gives his authority in 
favour of his countryman, not expressly but by 
saying that the ship which led the attack broke 
off the stern of a Phoenician ship, for we know 
that the Phoenician squadron was posted 
over against the Athenian contingent. The 
y^ginetan was second if not first, and 
Simonides gives the third place to a ship 
that came from Naxos. By common consent 
Athens and ^Egina shared the chief distinction 
of the day between them. The Athenian ships 
busied themselves with such of the enemy's 
fleet as offered resistance or were beached by 
their captains ; the yEginetans attacked those 
that attempted to escape by the southern 
channel (their way to the open sea). 

1 These were Peleus and Phocus, sons of ^Eacus. Tela- 
mon, also a son of ^Eacus, and Ajax, son of Telamon, were 
worshipped in Salamis. 



40 GREECE AND PERSIA 

The subjects of Xerxes, on the whole, dis- 
played great courage, not the less because they 
were fighting under the eyes of the king, who 
was watching the battle from a projecting point 
of Mount /Egaleos on the mainland of Attica. 
The native Persians and Medes, as inland 
peoples, were serving as what we call marines 
on board the ships furnished by the maritime 
provinces of Phcenicia, Egypt, and Cilicia. 
But they seldom had the chance of showing 
their prowess in boarding, and when they had 
they were hardly a match for their better-armed 
and more athletic antagonists. As for the 
management of the ships, the sailors from the 
east were not, as a rule, equal, either in resolu- 
tion or in skill, to the hardier races of the west. 
Their superior numbers, in the narrow space 
to which the battle was confined, were a 
hindrance rather than a help. There was no 
mutual confidence, and no common speech. 
And the cogent motive that sent them into 
action was fear of punishment or, at the best, 
obedience to a ruling race, while the Greeks 
were fighting for home and country. The 
Persian fleet was more successful where the 
Asiatic Greeks were matched with the squadrons 
from the Peloponnesus. Herodotus, himself an 
Asiatic Greek by birth, vindicates their honour 



THE WOODEN WALLS 41 

as combatants at the expense of their Greek 
patriotism. "I could mention," he says, "the 
names of many captains who took ships from 
the Greeks." He thinks it prudent, however, 
to omit them — and indeed when Herodotus 
wrote, such exploits would be better forgotten 
— and gives two names only, both of them 
well known already. He also mentions with 
pleasure the signal discomfiture of some 
Phcenician captains, who, having lost their 
ships early in the day, sought to excuse them- 
selves to Xerxes by laying the blame on the 
treasonable practices of the Greeks. The 
battle was still going on, and almost while they 
were speaking a Samothracian ship was seen 
to ram and sink an Athenian. It was in turn 
disabled by an y^Eginetan trireme. But the 
Samothracian crew were expert javelin- 
throwers. They cleared the deck of the 
/Eginetan, boarded, and captured it. Xerxes 
turned fiercely on the Phoenicians, and ordered 
that they should be instantly executed, as 
having ventured to slander men braver than 
themselves. 

Another incident of the day Herodotus 
relates from personal knowledge. His native 
city of Halicarnassus had been ruled for some 
years by Artemisia, the daughter of one 



42 



GREECE AND PERSIA 



Lygdamis and the widow of another. She had 
advised Xerxes not to engage the Greek fleet, 
speaking with a frankness which might well 
have put her life in danger. Overruled by- 
other counsellors, she did her best for the 
king's cause, but found herself in the greatest 
peril. An Athenian ship was in close pursuit 
of her, and there was a crowd of Persian 
vessels in front which hindered her escape. 
One of these belonged to a Carian neighbour, 
with whom, it is possible, she was not on the 
best of terms. She bore down upon his vessel, 
and sank it. The Athenian captain concluded 
at once that she had changed sides and was 
now fighting for Greece. He abandoned the 
pursuit, and Artemisia escaped. And she 
earned praise as well. "Sire," said one of the 
courtiers who stood by the king's seat, " dost 
thou see how bravely Artemisia bears herself ? 
She has just sunk a Greek ship." He was 
sure, he went on to say, that the exploit was 
Artemisia's, for he knew her flag. No one 
seemed to have suspected the truth, and fortu- 
nately for Artemisia there was not a single 
survivor from the Carian ship to tell the tale. 
Herodotus gives no estimate of the loss on 
either side. A later Greek writer says that two 
hundred Persian and forty Greek ships were 



THE WOODEN WALLS 43 

destroyed, and that the Persian loss in men was 
in a much greater proportion. Few of them 
could swim, and consequently, when a ship was 
sunk, the whole crew perished with it. Most 
of the Greeks, on the contrary, were able to 
save themselves by swimming. Another 
disaster to the king's forces was the total 
destruction of the Persian troops landed on the 
island of Psyttaleia. Aristides disembarked 
with some Greek heavy-armed, and put them 
all to the sword. Among them were some of 
the king's own guard. 



V 



THE BATTLES ON THE PLAIN AND ON THE 
SHORE 

AFTER the defeat at Salamis Xerxes 
withdrew his army into Thessaly. The 
result of his deliberations with his advisers was 
that he should himself go home, protected by 
a division of 60,000 men, and that his uncle 
Mardonius should stop in Greece with the 
intention of renewing the campaign in the 
following year. Mardonius was allowed to 
choose such portions of the army as he thought 
best, and having selected 300,000 men, went 
into winter quarters in Thessaly. It is need- 
less to relate all that happened during the six 
months or so that passed from the opening of 
the campaign in the spring of 479 up to the 
final struggle in the early autumn of that year. 
It will suffice to say that Mardonius did his 
best to detach the Athenians from the cause of 

Greece by the most liberal offers, and that the 

44 



BATTLES ON PLAIN AND ON SHORE 45 

Peloponnesians did all they could to bring 
about the same end by the consistent selfish- 
ness of their policy. To Mardonius the 
Athenians returned a firm refusal. To the 
Spartans they addressed a strong remonstrance. 
They represented that they had been already 
deserted, that the promise of help to be given 
for the defence of Attica had been shamefully 
broken. They hinted that if the Spartans 
and their friends persisted in neglecting every 
Greek interest outside the Isthmus they would 
be compelled, much against their will, to make 
terms with the enemy. 

The Spartans would probably have continued 
to temporise but for the plain speaking of a 
native of Tegea in Arcadia, a friendly state for 
which they felt the greatest respect. " No wall 
at the Isthmus will protect us," he said, " if you 
drive the Athenians into alliance with Persia. 
They will put their fleet at the disposal of the 
enemy, and you will be helpless." The change 
in the Spartan policy was dramatically sudden. 
That very night five thousand Spartans set out 
for the front, a larger force than the state 
ever before put into the field, or was ever to 
put afterwards. Each Spartan had seven light- 
armed helots to attend him. The same num- 
ber of the non-Spartan population of Laconia, 



46 GREECE AND PERSIA 

each with one helot, followed. Mardonius, on 
hearing of this movement, withdrew from Attica 
into Bceotia and prepared to give battle. 

The contingents of the Peloponnesian States 
mustered at Corinth. As they marched north, 
the Athenians, who had crossed over from 
Salamis, joined them. The whole force 
amounted to more than 100,000 men. It is 
not necessary to give all the numbers sent by 
the various states. The Lacedaemonians had 
10,000 heavy armed (with 40,000 light armed), 
the Tegeans 1,500, the Athenians 8,000 ; the 
other contingents, for reasons which will shortly 
appear, may be left out of the account. 

Mardonius had constructed an entrenched 
camp on the north or left bank of the river 
Asopus. In front of this camp he drew up his 
line of battle. The Greek army, which was 
under the command of Pausanias, uncle of one 
of the kings of Sparta and regent, took up 
its position on the slopes of Mount Cithseron. 
Their unwillingness to descend into the plain 
and come to close quarters emboldened 
Mardonius to attack them with his cavalry. 
The contingent from Megara happened to 
be in a peculiarly advanced or otherwise ex- 
posed situation, and suffered so severely that 
it had to send for help. It explains Pausanias's 



BATTLES ON PLAIN AND ON SHORE 47 

apparent timidity when we find that he could not 
induce any of his troops to go to the assistance 
of their hard-pressed countrymen. In the end 
three hundred Athenians volunteered for this 
service. They took with them a force of 
archers, an arm in which Megarians were entirely 
deficient. Some sharp fighting ensued ; at last 
an arrow killed the horse of the Persian general 
Masistius, and the general, a man of great 
stature and beauty, and a splendid figure in his 
gilded chain-armour, was thrown to the ground. 
This happened close to the Athenian lines, and 
Masistius was soon killed, though it was only 
by a thrust in the eye that he could be 
despatched, so impenetrable was his armour. 
The Persian cavalry, as soon as it became 
aware of its leader's fate, charged furiously to 
recover the body. For a time the Greeks 
were driven back, but they rallied and re- 
covered the prize. The Persians, demoralised, 
in the usual fashion of Asiatics, by the loss of 
their leader, retreated in disorder. 

Encouraged by this success, the Greeks 
descended into the plain, and took up a second 
position on the right bank of the Asopus. The 
Lacedaemonians occupied the right wing, the 
Athenians the left. A curious instance of the 
want of discipline in the army is afforded by 



48 GREECE AND PERSIA 

the dispute which arose between the Athenians 
and the Tegeans as to precedence. The first 
post of honour, the right wing, was conceded 
by common consent to the Lacedaemonians ; 
the second part, the left wing, was the matter 
in dispute. Tegea claimed it on account of 
various mythical exploits, and on more recent 
successes achieved in company with Sparta. 
Athens had also its mythical claims, but it 
relied on the victory at Marathon. The 
decision was given in favour of Athens by a 
general vote of the Lacedaemonian soldiery. 
The new position taken up by the Greeks was 
found to be anything but convenient. The 
army suffered from a scarcity of water ; it was 
unsafe to approach the river banks, for this was 
commanded by the Persian archers, and con- 
sequently the sole supply was a spring, known 
by the name of Gargaphia, which was close 
to the Lacedaemonian position. Mardonius 
shifted his line of battle a little to the west, so 
as to front the new Greek position. His picked 
native troops, the Persians and the Sacae 
(Turkomans) were posted, not in the centre, 
the post of honour in an Asiatic army, as we 
have seen more than once before, but on the 
left wing, where they would face the Spartans ; 
to the Theban contingent was allotted a place 



BATTLES ON PLAIN AND ON SHORE 49 

on the right where they were opposed to their 
old enemies of Athens. This was done at the 
suggestion of the Theban leaders, and the 
suggestion did credit, as we shall see, to their 
sagacity. 

For ten days the two armies remained in 
position without moving. The soothsayers on 
both sides reported that the sacrifices portended 
success to a policy of defence ; disaster, if an 
attack should be attempted. It was to the 
Greek cause that the delay was more perilous. 
The army suffered greatly from the incessant 
attacks of the Persian cavalry ; the scanty 
water supply was a great inconvenience and 
even a danger ; and when, at the suggestion 
of his Theban friends, Mardonius sent his 
cavalry to cut off the supplies that were sent 
by the passes of Cithseron into the Greek camp, 
the dangers of the situation were still further 
aggravated. But the most serious peril of all 
was of another kind. The spirit of party, 
without which no free state can exist, but by 
which every free state is ultimately ruined, was 
rife in the Greek ranks. The traitors who had 
shown the signal of the shield after Marathon 
were not absent from the ranks at Plataea. 
The Thebans, with malignant sagacity, sug- 
gested to Mardonius that he should rely on 

5 



50 GREECE AND PERSIA 

the influences that were working for him, and 
avoid a general engagement. Happily for 
Greece, he refused their advice, which was 
discreditable, he said, to Persian honour. A 
people so superior in war had no need to 
resort to such expedients. He resolved to 
assume the offensive. 

The Greeks were apprised of this change of 
plan by a visitor from the Persian camp. After 
nightfall, Alexander, King of Macedonia, who 
claimed to be descended from the great hero 
Achilles, rode up to the Athenian outposts and 
demanded speech with the generals. They 
were fetched by the guard, and he told them 
that Mardonius had tried in vain to obtain 
from the sacrifices signs that promised success, 
but that, nevertheless, he was determined to 
attack. "Be prepared," he went on, "and if 
you prevail, do something for my freedom ; I 
have risked my life for love of Greece, to save 
you from a surprise by the barbarians. I am 
Alexander of Macedon." 

When Pausanias heard the news he made 
a proposition to the Athenian generals, which, 
as coming from a Spartan, a race so punc- 
tilious in military honour, sounds very strange. 
He suggested that they should take the place 
of the Spartans on the right wing, where they 






BATTLES ON PLAIN AND ON SHORE 51 

would be opposed to the Persian infantry whom 
they had already conquered at Marathon, but 
whom the Spartans had never met in battle. 
The Athenians promptly agreed, but the move- 
ment was detected by Mardonius, and was met 
by a corresponding change in his line. On 
perceiving this, Pausanias reverted to the for- 
mer arrangement. 

The first offensive movement on the part of 
Mardonius was eminently successful. His 
cavalry got past, or broke through the 
Spartan line, so as to get at the spring of 
Gargaphia. This they choked, and so de- 
prived the Greek army of their only available 
water supply. 

A change of position became necessary. 
The new ground which the council of war 
determined to occupy was near Platsea, and 
went by the name of the Island, because it lay 
between two small streams which descend from 
Cithaeron. The army would have a water 
supply, and would be protected, in a degree, 
from the Persian cavalry. It was then too late 
to make the movement, which would not be 
practicable except under cover of darkness. 
The whole of the next day had to be spent 
in extreme discomfort ; and when at nightfall 
orders were given for a change of position, two 



52 GREECE AND PERSIA 

somewhat alarming incidents took place. The 
centre of the Greek force, comprising all the 
smaller contingents, had been so demoralised, 
it would seem, by the troubles of the day that, 
as soon as the night fell, they marched off, not 
to the Island, but beyond it, to a place which 
they very probably considered to be better 
protected against the harassing attacks of the 
cavalry. This was the town of Platsea itself. 
They took up a position in front of the temple 
of Here\ a building of considerable size, as we 
know from the ruins still to be seen, and on 
high ground. Here they had the town behind 
them, and ground, unfavourable to the action 
of cavalry on either side. The other discon- 
certing event was the conduct of one of the 
Spartan officers, Amompharetus by name. 1 
This man conceived that the movement 
ordered by Pausanias was a retreat, and so 
forbidden by the strict code of Spartan mili- 
tary honour. Accordingly he refused to move. 
An angry dispute followed, Pausanias and his 
second in command doing all they could to 

1 He commanded a lochos ; there were four in each 
mora, the whole force being divided into six mora. The 
divisions varied in size according to the number of men 
called out. On this occasion each mora would number 
830 men (about), and each lochus 207 (about). 






BATTLES ON PLAIN AND ON SHORE 53 

convince their subordinate, he obstinately- 
adhering to his decision. In the midst of 
the argument a messenger from the Athenians 
arrived on horseback. They were perplexed 
by the inaction of the Spartans, and, very 
possibly, suspicious of some design which 
would be compromising to their own safety. 
At the moment of this messenger's arrival 
Amompharetus had delivered his ultimatum. 
Taking up from the ground a huge stone, he 
cast it at the feet of Pausanias, saying at the 
same time, "I give my vote for staying" — 
the same word serves in Greek for vote and 
pebble, pebbles being used in the ballot-boxes. 
Pausanias hurriedly explained the situation to 
the Athenian, and begged him to carry back a 
message that he hoped his countrymen would 
not move till he could overcome the difficulty 
in which he found himself. This, indeed, 
seemed almost hopeless. At last, just before 
dawn, Pausanias made up his mind to leave 
the refractory captain behind. Finding him- 
self alone with his company, he would, he 
hoped, consent to follow. And this was what 
actually took place. 

By this time day was dawning, and Mar- 
donius became aware of what had happened. 
He seems to have looked upon the movement 



54 GREECE AND PERSIA 

in much the same way as Amompharetus had 
done. It was a flight. These Spartans, for 
all their boasted courage, were running away. 
His Persian troops answered the command 
by a disorderly advance. They crossed the 
Asopus, which, it will be remembered, flowed 
in front of their position, and hurried in the 
track of the Spartans ; the rest of the Asiatics 
followed their example. Pausanias sent a 
message to the Athenians, telling them that 
the Persians were concentrating their whole 
strength against his division, and begging that 
they would come to his help, at least by 
sending their archers. The Athenians, how- 
ever, had by this time work enough of their 
own to deal with, for the Thebans and Thes- 
salians had commenced an attack upon them. 

The Spartans, therefore, had to bear the 
brunt of the Persian attack alone. They had 
ten thousand heavy-armed and four times as 
many light-armed, numbers slightly increased 
by the contingent from Tegea, a force of three 
thousand, equally divided between the two 
classes of troops. Pausanias, who seems to 
have shown little ability or presence of mind 
from the beginning to the end of the cam- 
paign, was busy with the customary sacrifice. 
Unfortunately the victims showed no en- 



BATTLES ON PLAIN AND ON SHORE 55 

couraging signs, and he was content, possibly 
was compelled by the public opinion of his 
men — for a Greek army, even when it came 
from Sparta, was a democracy — to postpone 
any movement of offence till the Fates seemed 
propitious. Meanwhile his men were falling 
about him — one of the slain was reputed to 
be the handsomest man in the whole Greek 
army. 1 In an agony of distress, Pausanias 
lifted his eyes to the Temple of Here, which 
stood on a conspic\ ous height, and prayed for 
the help of the goddess. The signs imme- 
diately changed, and the welcome signal to 
charge was given. The Tegeans seem to 
have already moved. Together they ad- 
vanced against the Persian line, which was 
protected by a rampart of wicker shields, 
from behind which the archers had been 
pouring volleys of arrows. The rampart was 
soon broken down. Then a fierce hand-to- 
hand fight began. Again and again the 

1 His name was Callicrates, Fair and strong, as it might 
be rendered. There is a class of historical critics who 
would argue that the name gave rise to the legend, just 
as they suggest — this has actually been done — that the 
name of the fleet runner who traversed the distance 
between Athens and Sparta so speedily, shows the 
mythical character of the story. It was Pheidippides, i.e 
Horse-sparer's son. 



56 GREECE AND PERSIA 

Persian braves dashed themselves on the 
Spartans' spears and broke or strived to 
break them. " They were not one whit 
inferior to the Greeks in boldness and war- 
like spirit " — such is the testimony which men 
who had borne their part in that fierce struggle 
bore to the bravery of their antagonists — but 
their armament was less effective and their 
military training less complete. The battle 
raged most furiously about the person of 
Mardonius, who was surrounded by a body- 
guard of a thousand Immortals. As long as 
he lived these picked warriors held their own ; 
when he was struck down — a Spartan, Aeim- 
nestus 1 by name, had the credit of the deed — 
they fled in wild confusion to their camp. A 
body of forty thousand was led off the field 
by the general in command, when he saw how 
the fortune of the day was going. 

On the right wing of the Persian army the 
Theban infantry, always distinguished for its 
steady courage, held its own for a considerable 
time against the Athenians. It stood alone, 
however. The other Greeks, whom Xerxes or 
his lieutenant had pressed into the Persian 
service, felt no zeal for the cause, and took 
the first opportunity that occurred of retreat- 

1 Observe again the significant name — Ever remembered. 



BATTLES ON PLAIN AND ON SHORE 57 

ing. The Thebans, who must have been 
much inferior in numbers to their Athenian 
adversaries, were driven back, with a con- 
siderable loss in killed. They took refuge 
within the walls of their city. Their cavalry, 
indeed, achieved the only success that the 
army of Mardonius could boast. News 
reached the Greek centre, in its position out- 
side Plataea, that the right wing had put the 
Persians to flight, and it hurriedly advanced 
to take a share in the victory. The move- 
ment was made in a careless and disorderly 
way. So relaxed was discipline that the whole 
force did not even keep together. Two of the 
contingents, from Megara and Phlius (a small 
state in the north of the Peloponnese) were 
attacked by the Theban cavalry as they 
crossed the plain and suffered a very heavy 
loss, as many as six hundred being slain. 
" So they perished without honour," says 
Herodotus. It must be owned that from first 
to last the smaller Greek States earned little 
distinction in the war. 

The Persian entrenched camp was for a time 
a difficulty. The Spartans attacked it, but 
made no progress, being wholly unacquainted 
with the methods of assaulting fortified places. 
They had to await the arrival of the Athenians, 



58 



GREECE AND PERSIA 



who seem to have had, if not more experience, 
at least more intelligence. With their help the 
camp was taken by assault. The spoil was 
very great. Pausanias says that he saw at 
Athens the golden scymetar of Mardonius, 
taken from his tent on the day of the victory. 

The loss of the Persians was, of course, 
very great. Herodotus says that only 3,000 
survived. This may be an exaggeration, but 
it is doubtless true that the chances of escape 
were very small, and that no mercy would be 
shown. Of the Greeks 159 are said to have 
fallen. To this number must be added the 600 
cut off by the Theban cavalry, and about as 
many more who fell in the preliminary conflicts. 
Plutarch, while giving the same number as 
Herodotus, states that the total Greek loss, 
from first to last, was 1,360. 

Among the Spartan dead were Amompha- 
retus, and Aristodemus, the unhappy survivor 
of Thermopylae. 

Two of the Greek contingents, from Mantinea 
and from Elis, arrived after the battle was over. 
They fined the generals whose tardiness had 
deprived them of all share in the glory of the 
victory. 

Much might be said of what was done by the 
conquerors to commemorate their victory ; but 



BATTLES ON PLAIN AND ON SHORE 59 

my task is finished when the battle has been 
described. For one curious story, however, I 
must find room. Out of the tenth of the spoil 
dedicated to the Delphian Apollo, a golden 
tripod, or caldron, supported by three legs, was 
made. This tripod rested on a bronze pedestal. 
The gold was plundered by the Phocians about 
a century and a half later, but the pedestal was 
carried by the Emperor Constantine to his new 
capital on the Bosphorus. This relic was seen 
by English travellers in the seventeenth cen- 
tury, and was more minutely examined at the 
time of the Crimean war. The original inscrip- 
tion put by Pausanius was erased by the 
Lacedaemonians, a list of the states that took 
part in the battle being substituted. Solvents 
applied to the rust that had accumulated on the 
metal made this list legible. It contains the 
names of states which we know to have had no 
claim to the honour. This exactly agrees with 
what Herodotus tells us. Systematic falsifica- 
tion of history was carried on by the cities 
which by their misfortune or their fault took no 
part in the victory. 

The combined Greek fleet did little or 
nothing after the victory at Salamis, Themis- 
tocles proposed, indeed, a vigorous policy. The 



6o 



GREECE AND PERSIA 



Persians should be closely pursued, the bridge 
across the Hellespont destroyed, and the whole 
of the invading army destroyed. The Spartans 
took a different line, urging that Greece would 
do well to let an enemy, who might still be 
dangerous, depart without further molestation. 
This policy had something to be said for it, and 
Sparta carried the other allies with her. The 
Asiatic Greeks, however, were not disposed to 
lose the opportunity of freedom. In the spring 
of the following year (479) they sent envoys to 
the leaders of the Greek fleet, which was then 
stationed at ^Egina, begging them to follow up 
the successes already won. The envoys found 
their task a very difficult one. The Spartan 
Leotychides, who was in command, was un- 
willing to undertake the responsibility. He 
moved as far eastward as Delos, and there re- 
mained. Later in the year another effort was 
made, this time by three natives of Samos, 
which was then governed by a tyrant established 
in power by the Persians. The envoys urged on 
Leotychides the duty of helping his fellow 
Greeks to escape from the Persian yoke, 
and enlarged on the prospects of success. 
" Stranger," said the Spartan to the spokesman 
of the embassy, " tell me your name." 
" Hegisistratus " (army-leader), answered the 



BATTLES ON PLAIN AND ON SHORE 61 

man. " I accept the omen," cried Leotychides, 
and the resolution to advance was taken. 

The Greek admirals had expected to find the 
Persian fleet at Samos. In this they were 
disappointed. It had left the island, and had 
taken up a position on the mainland, where it 
would have the assistance of the army, number- 
ing, we are told, 60,000, which had been left to 
overawe the Greek cities. The place was 
Mycali, now known as Cape St. Mary. The 
channel between the mainland and Samos is 
here at its narrowest. The ships were beached, 
and protected by a rampart made of stones and 
timber. 

The first thing that Leotychides did, doubt- 
less suggested by the action of Themistocles at 
Artemisium, was to approach the Greeks serving 
in the Persian camp. He caused his ship to be 
brought as close as possible to the shore, and 
instructed a herald to proclaim, as he moved 
slowly along, a message to the Greeks. " Men 
of Ionia," such were the words, "when we join 
battle with the Persians, remember freedom." 
They might, he thought, act upon the sugges- 
tion, and turn their arms against the Persians. 
Anyhow, it would cause distrust and suspicion. 
The latter anticipation was at once fulfilled, 
The Persians disarmed the Samians, and sent 



62 GREECE AND PERSIA 

the contingent from Miletus to a distant spot, 
which they were to guard, the real object being 
to get them out of the way. This done they 
prepared to defend themselves against the 
Greeks, who were now advancing to the 
attack. 

And now there happened one of the strange 
events to which we may safely give the neutral 
name of coincidence. As the Greeks moved 
forward, a rumour ran from one end of the army 
to the other that a great battle had been won 
in Bceotia. At the same time some one saw a 
herald's staff 1 lying on the shore. The common 
belief at the time was, of course, in a divine 
interference. Later on the sceptical explana- 
tion that the commanders invented the story to 
encourage their troops became current. The 
strange phenomena of thought-currents, brain- 
waves, etc., familiar to modern experience, will, 
perhaps, account for the story as satisfactorily 
as can be expected. Anyhow the report was 
true ; the battle of Plataea had been fought and 
won in the morning of the day of Mycale. 

1 The herald's staff (scutale) was a contrivance for sending 
messages. A strip of leather, on which the message was 
written lengthwise, was rolled slantwise round a baton. 
When unrolled it could not be read, but when put on the 
similar baton in the hands of the officer abroad it again 
became legible. 



BATTLES ON PLAIN AND ON SHORE 63 

The actual conflict was very like that which 
occurred at Platsea. As we hear no more of 
the stockade of stone and timber with which 
the ships were protected, we may presume that 
the Greeks delivered their attack on the flank 
of the Persian position. Here a wicker rampart 
had been extemporised, just as it had been at 
Platsea. With the help of this the Persians 
were able for a time to hold their own. 
Herodotus goes so far as to say that they had 
not the worst of the battle. But the Athenians, 
anxious to secure the honours of the day before 
the Spartans arrived, renewed the attack with 
fresh vigour, broke down the wicker rampart, 
and pursued the flying enemy to their fortified 
camp. For a time, even when the rampart 
had fallen, the valiant Persians maintained the 
struggle. Then, overpowered by fresh arrivals, 
they slowly fell back. The Greek army 
advanced in two divisions, the Athenians and 
the contingents brigaded with them marching- 
over the level ground by the sea, the Spartans, 
with the Peloponnesians generally, taking an 
inland route which led them over some rough 
and difficult country. Naturally their progress 
was not rapid, and the battle was virtually 
decided when they reached the field of action. 

To the very last the Persians showed all the 






64 GREECE AND PERSIA 

courage and pluck of a ruling race. The 
Greek victory was by no means bloodless. 
The contingent from Sicyon, in particular, lost 
heavily. The result of the day, however, was 
definite enough. Some survivors from the 
battle contrived to escape to the hills, and 
thence to Sardis, but the army, as a whole, 
ceased to exist. The ships were naturally 
abandoned. Perhaps this was the most im- 
portant of the Greek successes, for it meant 
the liberation of the islands of the ^Egean. 
These were finally rescued from the yoke 
which had been heavy on them for half a 
century. 



BOOK II 
GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

I. THE LORD OF SYRACUSE 

IN the early part of the year 480, when the 
danger from Persia was imminent, the 
Greeks sent an embassy to their countrymen 
in Sicily, asking for help. The Greek power 
in the island was largely in the hands of one 
man, Gelo, tyrant of Syracuse. To him, there- 
fore, the application was made. Herodotus 
gives an account of the interview, profes- 
sing to report the speeches which were 
made at it. These may be epitomised 
thus : — 

Ambassadors : " The Persian King is 
bringing against us the strength of Asia. 
He professes to be seeking vengeance on 
Athens ; really, he is bent on subduing the 

6 6 s 



66 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

whole Greek race. If he should conquer us 
he will certainly attack you. Join with us 
therefore in resisting him. Combined, we 
shall be a match for him ; disunited, we shall 
certainly be conquered." 

Gelo : " When I asked you for help 
against Carthage you would not give it. For 
anything that you did to stop it, Sicily might 
have been conquered by the barbarians. But 
I will return good for evil. You shall have 
two hundred ships of war, twenty thousand 
men-at-arms, two thousand cavalry, as many 
more light-armed troops, and corn for your 
whole army as long as the war lasts. Only 
you must give me the chief command." 

Syagrus (the Spartan ambassador) : " What 
would King Agamemnon say if he heard 
that Sparta had given up her leadership to a 
man of Syracuse ? Know that we will not 
have your help upon such terms." 

Gelo : "It seems but fair that I who send 
so large a force should have the command. 
Still, if you are so stiff about the leadership, I 
will say — ' Command the army, and let me 
have the fleet ; or, if you like it better, take 
the fleet and give me the army.' " 

The Athenian Ambassador {interrupting 
before any one else could speak) : " The com- 



THE LORD OF SYRACUSE 67 

mand of the fleet is ours. We will yield it, 
indeed, to the Spartans, if they desire it, but 
we will yield it to no one else." 

Gelo : " Friends, you seem not to want 
for commanders, though you want for men. 
As you ask everything and yield nothing, go 
back to Greece and say that she has lost the 
spring out of the year." 

There is nothing improbable about this 
dialogue. Questions of precedence and leader- 
ship were regarded with great jealousy by 
States that were actually independent of each 
other and nominally equal. The strange thing 
is that Gelo makes no mention of the danger 
with which he was himself threatened. He 
brings up against the ambassadors the fact that 
the States which they represented had given 
him no help in conflict with Carthage (an inci- 
dent of which we know nothing from any other 
source), but he does not mention what was un- 
doubtedly the case that he was at the moment 
expecting another attack from the same 
quarter. It would have been quite impossible 
for Gelo to send fifty thousand troops — not to 
speak of the crews of the ships — out of Sicily, 
when he was certain to want every man that 
he could raise in the course of a few months. 

The truth is that there was another Asiatic 



68 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

power which was scarcely less formidable to 
European civilisation than Persia itself. I 
speak of Carthage. Though locally situated 
in North Africa as an Asiatic power, she was 
Phoenician in origin, character, and institutions. 
Founded by emigrants from Tyre some time 
in the ninth century B.C., she had always kept 
up a close connection with her mother- country 
of Phoenicia. One of the traditions of the race 
was to regard the Greeks as rivals or as ene- 
mies. Sicily, where Greeks began to settle in 
the eighth century, just about the time when 
Carthage was beginning to expand, and which, 
at its nearest point, was not more than a 
hundred miles from that city, naturally became 
a battlefield between the two races. Phoeni- 
cian traders had been in the habit of visiting 
the island long before the Greeks appeared 
upon the scene, and though they seem to have 
given up most of their scattered ports and 
factories, they continued to occupy three towns 
in the western division. Carthage therefore 
would find kinsfolk and friends when she 
sought to gain a foothold in Sicily. When 
this attempt was first made we do not know. 
The early history of the city is a blank. About 
550 B.C. we hear of one of its leaders making 
conquests in Sicily, among other places. That 



THE LORD OF SYRACUSE 69 

there was a great effort to conquer the island 
in 480 we cannot doubt. Probably it was the 
result of an agreement with Persia. There is, 
it is true, no evidence forthcoming of any com- 
pact of the kind ; but it is not likely that there 
would be such evidence. On the other hand, 
the Persian king may very easily have come to 
an arrangement with the Carthaginian govern- 
ment through Phoenician intermediaries. The 
Phoenician contingent was the largest in 
his fleet, and was high in his favour, at least 
until the disastrous defeat of Salamis. 1 The 
coincidence of time is, in itself, a strong argu- 
ment for the existence of a common plan. 

One of the many Hamilcars who figure in 
Carthaginian history was put in command of 
an army which is said to have numbered 
300,000 men. It was made up of Phoenicians, 
probably recruited in Carthage itself, and in 
various settlements of that race along the 
Mediterranean coast, of Africans from the 
home provinces, of natives of Sardinia, Cor- 
sica, and the Italian mainland, and, finally, of 
Spaniards, for Spain was by this time within 
the sphere of Carthaginian influence. Hamilcar 
landed at Panoromus and marched to Himera, 
which lay some twenty miles to the westward 
1 See p. 41. 



70 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

on the northern coast of the island. Some of 
his large fleet of transports, especially such as 
carried the cavalry and the war-chariots, were 
lost on the way, or lagged behind. Still the 
army, as a whole, was successfully transferred 
to Sicilian soil, and Hasdrubal, convinced that 
if this could be done his force would be practi- 
cally irresistible, is reported to have said : 
" The war is over." He had, we must re- 
member, another good reason for confidence. 
There was a powerful minority among the 
Greek cities which was prepared to welcome 
the interference of Carthage. Hamilcar had 
been actually invited by the banished tyrant of 
Himera. Unfortunately, any enemy of a Greek 
city could expect to find helpers within its 
walls in an unsuccessful party. Eager political 
life did much for the development of Greek 
character, but a heavy price had sometimes to 
be paid for its benefits. Hamilcar divided 
his force between two camps. One of them 
was for the crews of the fleet, which had 
all been beached with the exception of twenty 
swift vessels kept for an emergency ; the 
other was occupied by the army. Himera, 
on the other hand, prepared for a desperate 
resistance. Even the gates were bricked up. 
The garrison was under the command of 



THE LORD OF SYRACUSE 71 

Theron, tyrant of Agrigentum. His first step 
was to send off a messenger to Gelo with an 
urgent appeal for help. Gelo was ready to 
march. He had under his command fifty 
thousand infantry and five thousand horse. 
He reached Himera, and strongly fortified a 
camp outside the city. He had, as has been 
said, a strong force of cavalry, an arm in which 
the Carthaginians were deficient owing to the 
accident to the horse transports. This supe- 
riority he used to cut off the enemy's foraging 
parties. His success in these operations was so 
great as to raise the spirits of his troops. The 
inhabitants of Himera grew so confident that 
they pulled down the brickwork with which, as 
has been said, they had blocked up their gates. 
The decisive battle was not long delayed. 
We have no details of the tactics employed on 
either side, but we are told that the contest was 
long and bloody, lasting from sunrise almost 
to sunset. A daring stratagem seems to have 
done something towards deciding the issue of 
the battle. Gelo had intercepted a letter from 
the magistrates of the Greek city of Selinus to 
Hasdrubal, in which there was a promise that 
they would send a force of cavalry to his help. 
He intended some of his own horsemen to play 
the part of the cavalry of Selinus. They were 



72 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

to make their way into the enemy's camp and 
then take the opportunity of doing all the mis- 
chief they could. A concerted signal was to 
apprise the commander-in-chief of their success. 
On seeing he would press the attack with all 
possible vigour. This he did, and the result 
was the complete defeat of the Carthaginians. 

So far there is nothing improbable about the 
story. When we are told that one-half of the 
invading army fell on the field of battle we 
recognise one of the familiar exaggerations of 
ancient history. It is probable that the real 
number, both of the combatants and of the 
slain, was much smaller than that commonly 
received. However this may be, Carthage 
certainly suffered a disaster of the first magni- 
tude. Her army ceased to exist ; some of the 
fugitives probably made good their escape to 
the Phoenician strongholds in the island, but 
many were compelled to surrender to the con- 
querors. Some, doubtless, were ransomed by 
their friends at home ; the rest were sold as 
slaves. 

So fine an opportunity of pointing a moral 
and adorning a tale was not likely to be lost 
by the Greek writers. The story in the shape 
which it ultimately took was this : As both of 
the Carthaginian camps were captured by Gelo, 



THE LORD OF SYRACUSE 73 

the fleet met with the same fate as the army. 
But the squadron of twenty ships which had 
been reserved for emergencies made good its 
escape. But even these were not fated to 
reach the African shore. A storm overtook 
them on their voyage and all perished. One 
little boat, rowed by a single survivor, survived 
to carry the story of how the most splendid 
armament ever sent forth from Carthage had 
ceased to exist. Exactly the same story was 
told of the return of Xerxes after the defeat 
of Salamis. According to Herodotus, who 
had every opportunity of knowing the truth, 
the Persian king made his way back over- 
land, losing many men on the way from hunger 
and disease, but unmolested. So tame a con- 
clusion did not satisfy the Greek sense of 
the fitness of things. Tradition pictured the 
Persian king as making his escape after the 
battle in a single ship ; and Juvenal, when he 
was seeking illustrations for the great theme 
of the vanity of human wishes, found the 
legend admirably suited to his purpose. Xerxes 
had lashed the winds and put the sea in fetters 
when they hindered his triumphal march. But 
how did he return ? — 

" In one poor ship the baffled monarch fled 
O'er crimsoned seas and billows clogged with dead." 



74 



GREECE AND CARTHAGE 



The fate of Hamilcar himself was wrapped 
in romantic mystery. Some said that he was 
slain by one of the horsemen who made their 
way into the camp ; according to others he 
destroyed himself. While the conflict was 
raging he remained in the camp, occupied in 
soliciting the favour of the gods by costly 
sacrifices. He was not content to offer the 
victims in the usual way, by pieces taken from 
this or that part. They were thrown whole 
into the fire, which was built high in order to 
consume them. When he found that his 
devotion was unavailing and that the tide of 
battle was turning against him, he threw him- 
self into the furnace. Certain it is that he was 
never again seen alive. Gelo erected a monu- 
ment to him on the field of battle, and the 
Carthaginians paid to his memory yearly 
honours of sacrifice. There must have been 
some greatness in the man which was thus 
recognised by the conqueror, and by the city 
which had, one would think, no reason to be 
grateful to him. 



II 



THE STORM FROM AFRICA 

THOUGH the Carthaginians, for some 
reasons which we do not understand, 
commemorated Hamilcar on the field of 
Himera, they did their best at home to banish 
all recollection of his disastrous expedition. 
They even sent his son, Gisco, into exile for 
no reason except his unfortunate parentage. 
Gisco took up his abode in the Greek city of 
Selinus. A Greek city was not likely to be an 
agreeable home for a stranger not of Hellenic 
blood. The Greek's pride of race was intense ; 
all the outside world was barbarian to him. 
Anyhow, one of Gisco's children, Hannibal by 
name, carried away from the place where his 
youth was spent an intense dislike of the 
race. " He was by nature," says Diodorus, 
"a Greek-hater." The guilt of his race had 
been expiated, it would seem, by his father's 



76 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

lifelong exile, and he had been permitted to 
return home, and had even risen to the highest 
office in the State. 

An opportunity now came to him for grati- 
fying the animosity which he felt against the 
city of Selinus. This seems to have been in a 
state of chronic enmity with its neighbour 
Egesta. The quarrel between them had 
already led to the most disastrous conse- 
quences. It was the complaint of Egesta 
against their neighbours of Selinus that had 
given Athens a pretext for their Sicilian expe- 
dition. Only two years had passed since this 
expedition had come to an end, disastrous 
beyond all precedent in Greek history, and 
now this paltry quarrel was about to cause 
another devastating war. Egesta was, of 
course, worse off than when she made her 
unlucky application to Athens and was hard 
pressed by her Greek neighbours. She now 
sent envoys to Carthage. Hannibal, as I have 
said, saw his opportunity. He persuaded his 
countrymen to take up the cause of the weaker 
State. The first thing was to send envoys to 
Sicily with instructions so to manage the affair 
as to make an appeal to arms certain. 

They were to go to Syracuse in company 
with a deputation from Egesta, lay the affair 



THE STORM FROM AFRICA 77 

before that State, and offer to submit to arbi- 
tration. It was pretty certain that Selinus 
would refuse its consent, for it was practically 
in possession of the territory which was the 
matter in dispute. This, indeed, was exactly 
what happened. Selinus represented its case 
before the Syracusan assembly, but refused 
arbitration. Syracuse, accordingly, resolved 
to stand neutral, to maintain its alliance with 
Selinus, and to remain at peace with Carthage. 
Selinus, left to itself, failed to understand the 
danger in which it was placed. Five thousand 
Africans and eight hundred mercenaries from 
Italy, veterans who had served with the 
Athenians in the siege of Syracuse, but had 
left them or been discharged before the final 
catastrophe, came to the help of Egesta.. The 
Selinuntines took no heed of their arrival, but 
continued to ravage the enemy's territory. As 
they met with no opposition, they grew more 
and more careless. But the enemy was on the 
watch, and taking the invading force by sur- 
prise inflicted on them a heavy loss, killing or 
taking prisoners as many as one thousand 
men. 

Even now Selinus, it is possible, might have 
escaped her doom. My readers will remember 
that the State had been on friendly terms with 



78 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

Carthage, and had actually sent, or at least 
promised, help to Hamilcar when he was 
attacking Himera. 1 Had it asked for peace 
and appealed to these associations in support 
of the petition, Hannibal might not improb- 
ably have granted tolerable terms. His great 
quarrel was not against Selinus, but against 
Himera. It was at Himera that his grand- 
father had perished, and it was his grandfather's 
death that he desired above all things to 
avenge. But the Selinuntines appear to have 
been totally insensible of their danger. They 
asked for help from Syracuse, should the need 
arise, and received a promise that it would be 
given. But nothing was actually done. 

The fact is that no one in the island was 
aware of the vast preparations which Hannibal 
was making for an expedition in the following 
year. We are not told how the secret was 
kept ; but kept it was. When the storm burst 
on the Sicilian Greeks it took them by surprise, 
and it came with overpowering force. 

The numbers given by historians are, as 
usual, various and untrustworthy. 2 One writer 

1 See p. 71. 

2 It may be as well to explain that our knowledge of this 
period is derived chiefly from Diodorus Siculus, a writer of 
the first century of our era. He was a native of Sicily, and 



THE STORM FROM AFRICA 79 

gives 100,000, and this we may take as approxi- 
mating to the truth. The army was made up 
as usual of mercenaries, commanded, as far at 
least as the superior officers were concerned, 
by native Carthaginians. The city was now at 
the very height of its prosperity and could 
command a practically unlimited supply of men 
from the fighting races of the world. Africans, 
Spaniards, and Italians made up the force, 
with a mixture of Greeks, always ready to sell 
their swords to any paymaster. This great 
army was carried across the sea in fifteen 
hundred transports, and were landed in the bay 
of Motye\ not far from Lilybaeum, the western 
extremity of the island. Selinus is on the 
southern coast of the island, but Hannibal 
preferred to disembark his troops at some 
distance. Had he sailed any distance along 
the southern coast his advance might have 
been regarded as a menace to Syracuse and 

while writing something like an Universal History, gave 
special attention to the affairs of his own country. He had 
before him, it would appear, two writers of much earlier 
date, both of them Sicilians. These were Ephorus, who 
was born about 404 B.C., and Timaeus, who was about 
half a century later. Fragments only of their works 
survive, but practically all that Diodorus tells us about 
Sicilian affairs comes from them. Some details we get from 
Plutarch. 



80 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

the other Greek cities. His sagacity served 
him well. Syracuse, whether informed of what 
had happened or not, made no movement. 
Hannibal, on the other hand, lost no time, but 
marched straight to Selinus, his forces being 
increased by contingents from Egesta and the 
Carthaginian settlements. The walls of the 
town were ill-adapted to resist the attack of an 
army far outnumbering the force available for de- 
fence and amply furnished with everything that 
the engineers of the time could put at the dis- 
posal of a besieging force. Powerful catapults 
discharged showers of missiles which cleared 
the walls ; archers and slingers were posted at 
points of advantage where they could serve 
with the best effect the same purpose ; wooden 
towers, filled with armed men, were brought 
up to the walls, with which they were very 
nearly on a level ; elsewhere huge battering- 
rams were driven against such spots in the 
fortifications as showed any signs of weakness 
or decay. Every one of these methods of 
attack was made formidable in the extreme 
by the multitudes of men available for pushing 
them home. And Hannibal was present 
everywhere, urging on his soldiers with an 
almost fanatical energy. The siege lasted 
for nine days, the besiegers pressing the 



THE STORM FROM AFRICA 81 

assault with unabated energy, the besieged 
maintaining the defence with all the resolution 
of despair. There was no thought of capitu- 
lation. Indeed, the Carthaginian general 
would grant no terms. He had promised the 
plunder of the town to his soldiers, and Selinus 
had no other prospect than to resist or to 
perish. 

Assault after assault was delivered and 
repulsed. But it was a conflict that could not 
be indefinitely continued. The combatants in 
the place could hardly have exceeded ten 
thousand ; probably their number, even when 
swelled by every one who could hold a weapon, 
was under this figure. And they had all to be 
on service, with the very briefest intervals of 
rest, or with no intervals at all. The assailants 
came on by relays, of which there were so 
many that no one had to fight for more than 
three or four hours at a time. On the third or 
fourth day a body of Campanian mercenaries 
found their way into the town over a breach 
that had been made by the battering-rams. 
But Selinus was not yet taken. The towns- 
men gathered themselves up for a supreme 
effort, and the Campanians were driven out 
with the loss of many of their number. On 
the tenth day a Spanish force — the Spaniards 

7 



82 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

were always the most resolute fighters in the 
armies of Carthage — made their way into the 
town. This time the wearied citizens could 
not drive the storming party back. Yet they 
still resisted. Barricades were set up and 
desperately defended in the narrow streets, 
while the women and children showered tiles 
and bricks from the roofs and upper stories on 
the enemy below. A last stand was made in 
the market-place. Thus most of those who 
still survived were slain. Some fell alive into 
the hands of the enemy; two or three thousand 
made good their escape to Agrigentum. 

And all the while not a single soldier from 
any one of the Greek cities of Sicily came 
to help the unhappy town. Messenger after 
messenger had been sent to tell how pressing 
was the need, and to implore assistance, but no 
assistance was given. Agrigentum and Gela 
had indeed their forces ready to march, but 
they waited for Syracuse, and Syracuse was 
culpably tardy in moving. Possibly, as had 
been suggested, its rulers fancied that Han- 
nibal would waste time as they had lately seen 
Nicias, the Athenian commander, waste it 
before their walls. Anyhow, they waited first 
till a petty quarrel with two of their Greek 
neighbours was finished, and then till the 



THE STORM FROM AFRICA 83 

very largest and best equipped force that 
could be raised was ready to march. By this 
time the opportunity was lost. With horror, 
not unmixed with a certain fear for its own 
future, Syracuse heard that Selinus, a Dorian 
Greek city, like itself, had fallen. 

The fall of a city taken by storm has always 
been miserable in the extreme. In whatever 
respects the world may have advanced and 
improved, in this it remains much about the 
same. But the Carthaginians seem to have 
used their victory with more than common 
barbarity. That the prisoners should be 
slaughtered in cold blood was unhappily a 
common incident. A Greek conqueror was 
more likely than not to treat fellow Greeks in 
this way. But mutilation was a hideous 
barbarity, and in this Hannibal permitted his 
soldiers to indulge. I mention the fact because 
it helps us to realise how the world would have 
been put backward if Carthage had triumphed 
over Greece. Selinus was again inhabited, 
but it never recovered the terrible blow inflicted 
upon it by Hannibal. To this day the pros- 
trate columns of its temples, some of the most 
magnificent ruins in the world, bear the marks 
of the crowbars which the barbarous invaders 
used in overthrowing them. 



84 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

The main purpose of Hannibal was still to 
be accomplished. It was against Himera, the 
scene of his grandfather's defeat, that his 
expedition was really aimed, and, Selinus 
destroyed, he marched against the other city, 
which was on the north coast of the island, and 
about fifty miles distant. His numbers were 
swollen by recruits from the native Sicilian 
tribes, who had never reconciled themselves 
to the presence of the Greek settlers, and now 
gladly seized the opportunity of expelling them. 
Hannibal repeated at Himera the tactics which 
he had employed with success at Selinus. He 
delivered his attack without any delay, bringing 
his battering-rams to bear upon the walls, and 
bringing up his movable towers. Nothing was 
accomplished on the first day. The people of 
Himera had the help and, what was probably not 
less effective, the encouragement of a Syracusan 
contingent of 4,000 men. Repeated assaults 
of the besiegers were repulsed with great 
slaughter, and the spirits of the defenders rose 
high. So great indeed was the confidence 
which they felt in their superiority to the enemy 
that they resolved to take the offensive. At 
dawn on the second day a body of 10,000 men 
sallied forth from the town and fiercely attacked 
the investing force. The Carthaginians were 



THE STORM FROM AFRICA 85 

not prepared for any such action. Their first 
line was easily broken. The Greeks pursued 
the fugitives and inflicted upon them a heavy 
loss, killing, it is said by one writer, as many as 
20,000 men. As this number would allow an 
average of two victims to each combatant, it 
may safely be rejected. The 6,000 given by a 
more sober historian is probably much nearer, 
though not under the number. But the easy 
success of the sally led to disaster. Hannibal 
was watching the affair from some elevated 
ground in the rear of the position, and he now 
moved forward. He found the Greeks 
exhausted and breathless, and after a fierce 
struggle drove them back. The main body 
reached the gates of Himera, though not 
without loss, but 3,000 men were isolated on 
the plain and perished to a man. 

While the struggle was proceeding, a 
squadron of twenty-five ships of war arrived 
from Syracuse. Unfortunately they brought 
with them some alarming news. In passing 
the Carthaginian port of Motye they had 
observed signs of preparation in the fleet. 
The explanation suggested and received was 
that the enemy were preparing to attack 
Syracuse. The captain of the Syracusan 
contingent, Diodes by name, was profoundly 



86 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

alarmed by this intelligence. The defence of 
Himera became a secondary consideration in 
view of what he believed to be the instant 
danger of Syracuse itself. He ordered the 
warships to return immediately. He even 
insisted on taking back the troops under his 
own command. The Himeraeans remonstrated 
against this desertion, but remonstrated in 
vain. It could hardly be denied that Diodes 
was acting in the interest, at least in the 
immediate interest, of Syracuse. All that he 
would agree to, in the way of compromise, was 
that the ships should transport as many of the 
Himeraeans as could be taken on board to 
Messana, which was about 150 miles distant 
(Syracuse was 100 miles further off), and that 
they should return with all speed to take away 
the remainder. Those who were left behind, 
or elected to remain, should do their best in 
the meantime to hold the city. As for Diodes, 
he marched away in such haste that he left the 
bodies of such of his own men as had fallen in 
the recent conflict unburied — the most shame- 
ful confession that a Greek general could 
make of weakness or defeat. The next day 
Hannibal renewed the attack. The brave 
Himeraeans still repulsed him. For the whole 
of that day they were able to hold their own. 



THE STORM FROM AFRICA 87 

If they could have maintained their resistance 
for yet another twelve hours, all might have 
been well, for the ships, which clearly could 
not have gone so far as Messana, were seen 
to be returning. But their strength was 
exhausted. A breach had been made in the 
walls, and the Spaniards, again showing their 
superiority over Hannibal's other troops, forced 
their way through it. A few of the Himerseans 
made their way to the ships ; but the great 
mass of the population was either slain or 
captured. Hannibal, while giving up the 
spoil of the city without reserve to his soldiers, 
did his best to stop the massacre. But there 
was no mercy in his motives. The women 
and children were either distributed among the 
conquerors or sold as slaves. The male 
captives of full age, 3,000 in number, were 
taken to the precise spot where Hamilcar had 
been last seen alive, cruelly mutilated and 
slain. We read of many barbarous acts in 
Greek history, but of nothing so atrocious as 
this. If we can see but little trace of humanity, 
as we understand it, in the Greek character, 
the people had a sense of fitness, a restraining 
power of taste, if not of conscience, that forbad 
such horrors. 

The danger that threatened civilisation must 



88 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

have seemed great at the time, though it was 
probably less than had been the case when the 
fate of the world, so to speak, had been in sus- 
pense on the day of Salamis. But the fears of 
Sicily, felt also, we may believe, in mainland 
Greece, were suddenly relieved. Hannibal 
had accomplished his object. He had exacted 
a never-to-be-forgotten vengeance for the death 
of his grandfather, and he wanted no more. 
Half Sicily was now in the hands of Carthage, 
and the Greek name was more humbled than it 
had been within the memory of man. He 
disbanded his army, and returned, laden with 
the spoils of war, to Carthage, where he was 
received with enthusiasm. 

But the danger was only postponed. If 
Hannibal had been satisfied with the results of 
his campaign, Carthage was not. Its old 
ambition of dominating Sicily was revived, and 
for the next four years it made costly and 
incessant preparations for another invasion of 
the eastern or Greek portion of the island. 
Unfortunately the Sicilian Greeks spent the 
time, not in consolidating their strength, but in 
intestine strife. The most eminent citizen of 
Syracuse had made repeated attempts to 
establish a despotism. He had met with 
failure and death, but he left behind him a 



THE STORM FROM AFRICA 89 

legacy of political hatred that might well have 
proved fatal to the State. 

In 407 the hostile intention of Carthage 
became known to the Sicilian Greeks. They 
sent envoys to make a remonstrance, and to 
suggest a treaty of peace. No answer was 
given, and the preparations went on with 
unabated zeal. 

In the following year the expedition sailed. 
Hannibal was again in command, but he shared 
his power with a young kinsman, Himilco by 
name. His force, on the most moderate 
computation, amounted to 120,000 men, with 
a fleet of 120 ships of war. It was in Agrigen- 
tum, to which the frontier of Greek Sicily had 
now been pushed back, that the storm was first 
to fall. 

Agrigentum was a splendid city, second only 
to Syracuse in population, and not yielding 
even to it in magnificence and wealth. No 
city in the island or even in mainland Greece, 
Athens only excepted, could boast more stately 
temples and public buildings. Surrounded by 
a large and fertile territory, it carried on a 
profitable trade with the African coast. It 
could boast of one kind of wealth in which 
few Greek cities could vie with it — a noble 
breed of horses, which were seen at least as 



90 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

often in the front at the chariot- races of 
Olympia as the teams sent from Syracuse or 
Argos. Only two years before the time of 
which I am speaking an Agrigentine citizen 
had won the prize for four-horse chariots, and 
on his return home had been escorted from the 
frontier by three hundred private chariots each 
drawn by two white horses. 

Agrigentum was built on a site naturally 
strong and had been skilfully fortified. It 
occupied a group, or rather part of a group, 
of hills which on all sides but one, the south- 
western, rose precipitously from the plain, so 
precipitously indeed that attack was impossible. 
On the north-east, crowning the height of the 
most lofty hill, was the citadel, approachable 
by one narrow path only. 

While the fortifications were strong and well 
cared for, they were also adequately garrisoned. 
Besides a numerous force raised from her own 
citizens Agrigentum had in her pay eight 
hundred Campanian mercenaries, who three 
years before had served under Hannibal, and 
had thrown up their engagement dissatisfied 
with their pay. She had also secured the 
services of fifteen hundred other mercenaries 
who were under the command of Dexippus, 
a Spartan soldier of fortune. The citizens 



THE STORM FROM AFRICA 91 

were confident in their ability to repel any 
attack that might be made on them. When 
Hannibal proposed a treaty of alliance, which, 
however, would permit Agrigentum to stand 
neutral in the approaching conflict, it was 
promptly rejected. 

For a while all went well with the defence. 
Hannibal assaulted the town at the only point 
where an assault was possible, but accom- 
plished nothing. He even lost his siege train, 
for the Agrigentines made a sally, captured, 
and burnt it. He then adopted the alternative 
plan of constructing a mound which would put 
the assailants on a level with the walls. The 
cemetery of Agrigentum was situated outside 
the walls in the same quarter as that which was 
the scene of the attack. Indeed, it was only 
here that there was any level space. Massive 
tombs of stone, in which reposed the remains 
of distinguished or wealthy Agrigentines of past 
days, abounded, and Hannibal, with the national 
carelessness of all religions other than his own, 
determined to make use of these materials for 
his siege work. His workmen had destroyed 
many of the tombs, and were busy with the 
most splendid of them all, that of Theron 
(tyrant of Agrigentum from 488 to 472) when 
a thunderbolt fell on the spot. This was 



92 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

regarded by the Carthaginians as a manifest 
token of the divine displeasure. The panic 
which followed largely increased the fatalities 
from a disease which now appeared in the 
camp. Thousands perished, Hannibal himself 
being one of the victims. It was not till 
various expiations, one of them a human sacri- 
fice, had been made that Himilco, who now 
succeeded to the chief command, was able to 
resume the operations of the siege. 

But fortune still seemed to favour the Greek 
cause. The other Greek cities had been 
actively employed in raising a relieving force. 
A Syracusan army, made up by contingents 
from Gela and Camarina to 30,000 foot and 
5,000 horse, reached the Agrigentine territory. 
Himilco despatched a force of Spaniards and 
Italians to contest their further advance. After 
a fierce fight the Carthaginian mercenaries were 
broken, and compelled to retreat to their camp. 
Daphnseus of Syracuse, who was in chief 
command, possibly recollecting the disastrous 
result of the too vigorous pursuit of the enemy 
before Selinus, held back his men when they 
would have followed up the victory. The 
officers in command at Agrigentum were 
equally cautious. Their troops were eager 
to sally out from the gates and fall upon the 



THE STORM FROM AFRICA 93 

flying mercenaries as they hurried past in 
disorder, but the generals absolutely refused 
their permission, and the opportunity of com- 
pletely destroying the enemy — so at least the 
malcontents contended — was lost. 

The allies now entered the town amidst 
general rejoicing. It was not long, however, 
before a discordant note was heard. Loud 
complaints were made of the supineness of 
the Agrigentine generals in allowing the 
enemy to escape. Some went so far as to 
suggest that a treasonable understanding 
existed between the Agrigentine generals and 
Himilco. A public assembly was hurriedly 
convened, and the accused generals were 
put upon their trials. The leader of the 
contingent from Camarina, Menes by name, 
ranged himself with the accusers. What 
evidence was brought against the generals we 
do not know. It is quite possible that there 
was nothing worthy of the name, for a 
Southern mob was ready then, as, indeed, it 
is now, to take its wildest guesses as truth. 
Anyhow their defence, whatever it was, availed 
nothing. Four out of the five were stoned to 
death, the fifth was allowed to escape in con- 
sideration of his youth. At the same time the 
Spartan Dexippus was severely censured. 



94 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

This deplorable affair bears a curious resem- 
blance to a well-known incident in Athenian 
history, which indeed almost coincided with it 
in time : the execution of the Athenian generals 
after the victory at Arginusae, on the charge 
of having neglected to do all that was possible 
in saving the lives of the shipwrecked crews. 
It shows, as any one who tells the story of 
Greece has many occasions of showing, the dark 
side of free political life. For the time, how- 
ever, no ill result seemed to follow, as far as 
the war was concerned. The tide of fortune 
still ran strongly against the invading army. 
Himilco had practically to raise the siege of 
Agrigentum, and was besieged in his own 
camp. This was too strongly fortified to be 
taken by assault, but it seemed in danger of 
being reduced by famine. Daphnaeus was 
strong enough to cut off the supplies, and 
the Carthaginians were reduced to the greatest 
straits. Some of the mercenaries mutinied, 
and were with difficulty pacified by having 
handed over to them the plate which the 
wealthy Carthaginians who held high com- 
mand in the army had brought with them. 
Then by a bold coup Himilco effected a total 
change in the situation. Agrigentum was 
mainly supplied from Syracuse, and towards the 



THE STORM FROM AFRICA 95 

end of the year a fleet of transports carrying 
stores was on its way under the escort of some 
Syracusan ships-of-war. The Carthaginian 
fleet had been inactive since the beginning 
of the campaign, and the Greek commanders 
seem to have thought that it might safely be 
neglected. In this they were soon undeceived. 
A squadron of forty ships-of-war issued unex- 
pectedly from Moty4 attacked the escorting 
ships, of which they destroyed eight, driving 
the rest ashore, and succeeded in capturing the 
whole of the convoy. The positions of the 
two armies were now reversed. The Cartha- 
ginians were possessed of abundance of sup- 
plies ; the Greeks were threatened with famine. 
The mercenaries in the service of Dexippus 
approached him with a complaint. He was 
unable to satisfy them, and they marched away 
to Messana, alleging that the time for which 
they had been engaged was expired. The 
alarm caused by this desertion was great, and 
Dexippus took no pains to allay it. He had 
not forgotten the fate of the Agrigentine 
generals or the censure passed upon himself. 
The magistrates of Agrigentum instituted an 
inquiry into the condition and amount of the 
supplies still remaining in the city, and found 
that very little was left. They lost no time 



96 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

in deciding on a course of action. Agrigentum 
must be evacuated, and that at once. That 
very night all the population, except the sick 
and helpless, and a few patriots who preferred 
dying in their native city to leaving it, hurriedly 
fled to Gela, their rear being guarded by the 
Syracusan and Agrigentine troops. They 
escaped with their lives and with such property 
as they were able to carry off. Those that 
remained behind were slaughtered without 
mercy, unless they preferred to put an end to 
their own lives. Some had hoped to find 
safety in the temples, but the Carthaginians 
showed no respect for the sacred places of the 
city, which they plundered and destroyed as 
remorselessly as they did the secular. 

But the tide of Carthaginian success had not 
yet reached its height. Two more Greek cities, 
Gela and Camarina, had to be evacuated. 
Practically Syracuse and Messana alone re- 
mained. If this success had been attained in 
480 the prospect of European civilisation would 
have been dark indeed. Happily by this time 
Persia, Carthage's natural ally, had ceased to 
be formidable. 

It would demand too much time, and would 
take me too far from my proper subject, if I 
were to relate in detail the history of the war. 



THE STORM FROM AFRICA 97 

It can hardly be doubted that there had been 
much mismanagement on the part of the 
Syracusan generals. But all the mistakes 
which they made might have been repaired 
without serious loss to the State and to the 
welfare of the Greek race in Sicily, if it had not 
been for the unscrupulous ambition of a 
Syracusan citizen. A short time before the 
Carthaginian invasion there had been attempts 
on the part of one of the leaders of the aristo- 
cracy of Syracuse to make himself an absolute 
ruler. He perished in the enterprise, but his 
plan did not die with him. A certain Dionysius, 
who had married the daughter of the deceased 
man, now saw in the popular indignation against 
the incompetent generals an opportunity of 
securing his own ends. He brought about 
their condemnation, and procured his own 
election in their place. A crafty manoeuvre 
enabled him to surround himself with a body- 
guard. In the end he made himself master of 
the city. Ostensibly he was the chief citizen 
of the republic. The coins of Syracuse still 
bore the figure of the personified city, for 
Dionysius did not venture to put his own like- 
ness upon them. But practically he was 
absolute. So far the success of the Carthaginian 
invasion had helped him. He would never 



98 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

have risen to supreme power had it not been 
for the terrible disasters which had overtaken 
Agrigentum, Camarina, and Gela, and had 
seemed to make him a necessary person. But 
he felt, of course, that Syracuse must not fall. 
Fortunately for his plans, he found that 
Himilco was not in a position to carry the war 
further. The Carthaginian army, loosely con- 
stituted of mercenaries gathered from many 
countries, had fallen into a disorganised con- 
dition. The sickness that had worked such 
havoc during the siege of Agrigentum had 
broken out again, and had claimed thousands of 
victims. Without much difficulty an agree- 
ment was arrived at. The Carthaginians were 
to keep all their former possessions and their 
recent acquisitions. Only Gela and Camarina 
might be reoccupied by their former inhabitants, 
on the condition of paying tribute. And — for 
here was the important article of the treaty — 
Syramse was to be subject to Dionysius. Peace 
was concluded on these terms, and the Cartha- 
ginian army returned home, carrying back with 
it, we are told, the terrible disease which had 
wrought so much damage in Sicily. 



Ill 



DIONYSIUS THE TYRANT 

WE may feel pretty certain that neither 
of the two parties to the treaty which 
brought the war of 407-6 to an end had any 
intention of keeping it longer than it might suit 
his or their convenience. Dionysius had skil- 
fully used the war to raise himself to despotic 
power ; Carthage probably expected that once 
again, as so often before, the internal quarrels 
of the Greek people might give her the 
opportunity of some fresh aggrandisement. 
She had accomplished much in a few years, 
though not without severe losses. But these 
losses, after all, counted but for little. The 
blood of mercenaries was cheap. As long as 
the city's sources of income were untouched, 
she could reckon with certainty on gathering as 
many recruits from Africa, Spain, Italy, and 
the shores of the western Mediterranean as she 
might choose to pay for. She had therefore no 

09 



ioo GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

small reason to believe that her long-cherished 
scheme of subjugating Sicily might be accom- 
plished at no distant date. 

Peace lasted for some eight years — years 
which Dionysius utilised to consolidate his 
power at home, and to extend his dominions 
abroad. He felt acutely the reproach levelled 
against him by his enemies that his power 
rested on Carthaginian support, and was anxious 
to remove it. In 397 he felt himself strong 
enough to act, and taking the people into his 
counsel, for he was careful to observe the forms 
of constitutional government, proposed to com- 
mence hostilities. No declaration of war was 
made, but the property of Carthaginian residents 
in Syracuse was given up to plunder, and the 
trading vessels in the harbour were seized as 
prizes. If Carthaginian wealth excited the 
cupidity of their Greek neighbours, so their 
oppressive rule and brutal manners were the 
objects of universal hatred. As soon as the 
news of what had been done in Syracuse with 
the consent, and, indeed, at the suggestion of, 
Dionysius spread through the Island, it was 
followed by a general massacre of the Cartha- 
ginian inhabitants. In all the cities which the 
late campaigns had left in a dependent or 
tributary condition there was a rising of the 



DIONYSIUS THE TYRANT 101 

population against their Carthaginian masters, 
and a massacre followed not unlike that which 
was planned and partially carried out amongst 
the Danes of East Anglia on St. Brice's Day, 
1006, a.d., or that which is known as the 
Sicilian Vespers in 1282. In a very short 
time the region actually held by Carthage in 
the Island did not extend beyond her strong- 
holds on the western coast. 

Dionysius followed up these proceedings by 
an ultimatum. Carthage might have peace if 
she would renounce her dominion over all the 
Greek cities ; failing this, she must prepare for 
war. To such a demand there could be but 
one answer. Dionysius did not even wait for 
the inevitable negative, but marched with the 
whole military strength of the Island — never 
probably gathered in such strength or with 
such unanimity before — against the stronghold 
of Motye. The Carthaginians resisted with an 
obstinacy which is characteristic of the Semitic 
race. One line of defence after another was 
stoutly maintained. When the walls had to be 
given up, the streets were barricaded. In this 
kind of fighting the Greeks lost heavily. At 
last a stratagem which is not without parallel 
in modern warfare proved effective. For some 
days in succession the assailants ceased fighting 



102 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

at sunset, the signal for recall being sounded on 
a trumpet. This came to be expected by the 
townspeople, who began to relax their watch- 
fulness. But Dionysius prepared a picked 
force which was to make a night attack. This 
was done before the Motyans were aware of 
what had happened, and the town was taken. 
A massacre followed in which many were 
destroyed, though Dionysius did his best to 
stop it. He was certainly not specially humane, 
but he did not approve of the useless destruc- 
tion of what, in the shape of slaves, might be 
valuable property. It is to be noted that the 
Greeks respected the lives of those who fled 
to the temples for protection. It shows them 
to have been on a somewhat higher plane 
of feeling than were the Carthaginians. The 
temples, it must be remembered, were those of 
Punic gods. 

Carthage had no intention of allowing these 
attacks to pass without retaliation. A large 
force, amounting at the lowest estimate to 
100,000 men, was levied in Africa and landed 
in Sicily, where it received an accession of 
another 30,000. Himilco, who had commanded 
in the last campaign, was made general-in- 
chief. He conceived a novel and bold plan of 
campaign. He marched to north-eastern Sicily, 



DIONYSIUS THE TYRANT 103 

a part of the Island which up to that time had 
been exempt from attack. Messana was his 
objective point, and Messana was almost help- 
less. It had walls, indeed, but these were in 
repair so bad that they were useless for any- 
real defence. And then a considerable part of 
the army was with Dionysius and the Syra- 
cusans. What was left boldly confronted the 
enemy in the field. Himilco did not offer them 
battle, but embarking a considerable force in 
the ships' which moved along the coast as the 
enemy advanced, made a direct attack on the 
town. He calculated that the ships would out- 
strip the Messanian army, and he proved to be 
right. The Carthaginians found the place 
almost deserted, and simply poured into the 
town by the gaps in the walls. The forts he 
could not take. Some of the inhabitants were 
slain in a hopeless attempt to hold the town ; 
some attempted the desperate expedient of 
swimming across the Strait of Scylla and 
Charybdis, whose terrors were not so formidable 
as the ferocity of the Carthaginians — out of two 
hundred swimmers fifty got safe to the Italian 
side. Messana gained, Himilco marched on 
Syracuse, intending to take Catana on his way. 
The army was to follow the line of the seashore ; 
the fleet was to keep on a level with it. At 



104 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

yEtna a diversion had to be made. The volcano 
was in action, and the streams of lava that 
flowed down the eastern slope compelled the 
army to make a detour to the west. Dionysius 
thought he saw his opportunity in this division 
of the invading force. He put both his army 
and his fleet in motion, and proceeded to meet 
the enemy. Only the fleets, however, came 
into collision, and the result was a serious defeat 
of the Syracusans. The admiral, Leptines by 
name, had been strictly enjoined to be cautious ; 
to keep his fleet in close order, and on no 
account to break the line. This tactic did not 
suit him. He attacked the enemy with a 
squadron of thirty quick-moving ships, at first 
with brilliant success. Then what the more 
prudent Dionysius had feared came to pass. 
Leptines could not hold his own against the 
overpowering numbers of the enemy. After 
some hours of fighting he had to make his 
escape with what ships were left to him. He 
had lost a hundred ships and, it was said, as 
many as twenty thousand men. 

Dionysius had watched the disaster from the 
shore without being able to give any help to 
his comrades. The question what he was 
himself to do became urgent, His bolder 
counsellors urged him to save battle to Himilco. 



DIONYSIUS THE TYRANT 105 

He was half disposed to follow their advice, 
but the risk seemed too great. It would be to 
hazard everything on one throw of the dice. 
He retreated on Syracuse, and took shelter 
within the walls. Himilco promptly followed. 
His army, said to have numbered 300,000, and 
certainly large, was easily able to invest the 
city on the landward side ; his fleet filled the 
Great Harbour, though this had an area of 
nearly four square miles. The Syracusan 
army did not dare to leave the shelter of their 
walls ; the fleet was glad to be protected by 
the defences of the Inner Harbour, a refuge 
which had never yet been entered by a foe. 
Never had the Greek race in Sicily been 
reduced to straits so desperate. Only one 
city remained to it, and this closely invested. 
Syracuse was like Jerusalem as Isaiah describes 
her in the height of the Assyrian invasion, " a 
cottage in a vineyard, a lodge in a garden of 
cucumbers." 

Then the tide began to turn. The Syracusans 
obtained some successes at sea. Some corn 
ships carrying supplies to the Carthaginian 
camp were captured, and a squadron of men-of- 
war which attempted to recover them defeated 
with a loss of more than half its number, 
including the admiral's ship. 



106 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

Then pestilence, an attack of bubonic plague 
if we are to judge from the description given of 
it, broke out in the camp. It was aggravated 
by religious terrors. Himilco had shown 
himself as careless about sacred things as his 
predecessor in command. He had broken 
down tombs to use their materials, and had 
plundered temples, one of them of especial 
sanctity, the shrine of Persephone, Queen of 
Hell, and her mother Demeter (the Ceres of 
Roman mythology). Thousands of men 
perished — the historians, dealing, as usual, in 
enormous figures, say one hundred and fifty 
thousand. The mortality was certainly great, 
and Dionysius did not fail to use his oppor- 
tunity. He delivered simultaneous attacks by 
land and sea, and was successful in both. The 
fleet was nearly destroyed. Many ships were 
captured ; many more were burnt. Part of the 
camp was taken. Dionysius took up his 
quarters at the close of the day near the 
temple of Zeus, in which Himilco had had his 
headquarters that very morning. 

The Carthaginian general then opened secret 
negotiations with his antagonist. To tell the 
story in a few words, he purchased the safety 
of himself and the native Carthaginian officers 
in the army by a bribe of three hundred talents. 



DIONYSIUS THE TYRANT 107 

The money went into the private coffers of 
Dionysius, and Himilco was allowed to escape 
with his countrymen, though some of the forty 
ships filled with the fugitives were captured. 
The Syracusan admiral, of course, knew 
nothing about the arrangement, and Dionysius, 
while he contrived to postpone, could not 
absolutely forbid pursuit. The mercenaries 
thus left to their fate had various fortunes. 
Dionysius took some of them into his own 
service ; the native Sicilians contrived, for 
the most part, to escape unmolested to their 
own homes. A considerable number sur- 
rendered, and were sold as slaves. Himilco 
reached Carthage in safety, but could not 
endure the humiliating position in which he 
found himself. He blocked up the doors of 
his house, refused admittance to friends and 
kinsmen, even to his own children, and died by 
voluntary starvation. 

Whether Carthage would have made any 
attempt to recover what had been lost, we 
cannot say. The events that followed made 
it impossible. Her African subjects revolted 
from her ; her allies deserted her. For a few 
weeks she stood as much alone as Syracuse 
had stood a few weeks before. But the com- 
bination against her was not one that could 



108 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

hold together long. It soon began to fall to 
pieces, Carthage helping the process by heavily 
bribing the leaders. But her power was 
crippled for a time, and she had to be content 
with withdrawing her boundary line in Sicily 
to its old place in the western portion of the 
Island. 

It would be tedious to follow in detail the 
wars of the next few years. War followed war ; 
sometimes one party triumphed, sometimes 
another. We have just seen Carthage reduced 
again to the narrow limits within which she 
had been confined before 409. Then, twelve 
years afterwards (383), Dionysius is compelled, 
after a disastrous defeat at Cronium, at which 
he is said to have lost 14,000 men, to concede 
nearly half of the Island. In 368 again — our 
knowledge of these campaigns is sadly broken 
and confused — there is another change of 
fortune, a brilliant victory of Dionysius, fol- 
lowed, however, by a reverse, which had the 
effect of leaving things very much as they had 
been when the campaign began. 

In 367 Dionysius died, after a reign of thirty- 
eight years. I am not concerned now with 
his character as a domestic ruler. In this 
respect his name is proverbial for a cruel 
tyranny, amply punished by the torturing 



DIONYSIUS THE TYRANT 109 

suspicions with which the life of the tyrant 
was harassed. But it is impossible to deny 
his great merits as a soldier. He had faults, 
but he certainly supported the Greek cause in 
Sicily against the incessant attacks of a very 
powerful enemy. We shall see how much his 
abilities were missed when his power passed 
into the hands of a feebler successor. 



IV 



THE DELIVERER FROM CORINTH 

THE younger Dionysius was indeed wholly 
unequal to the position into which he 
was thrust by the accident of birth. He was 
entirely inexperienced in government, for his 
father had jealously excluded him from all 
share in public affairs, and he had little capacity 
for learning the art of rule when he found 
himself under the necessity of practising it. 
Some ability he had, but it was not in the 
direction of politics. In this direction he seems 
to have had few ideas beyond securing his own 
safety and getting as much enjoyment as 
possible out of the opportunities of power. 
The history of his reign may be told in a very 
few words. He held the power inherited from 
his father during a period of fourteen years. 
Then he was expelled from Syracuse, but 
contrived to establish himself at Locri, with 



THE DELIVERER FROM CORINTH in 

which city he was connected through his 
mother. After the lapse of ten years he re- 
gained possession of Syracuse. But his power 
was not secure, and he could not spare any 
thought or energy for the general interests of 
the Island. The other Sicilian cities were no 
better off. Carthage, of course, made use of 
the opportunity thus given, and steadily in- 
creased her power. The situation became so 
threatening in 344 that some Syracusan exiles 
bethought them of invoking the aid of Corinth, 
their mother city. Corinth acceded to their 
request, but rather by way of permission than 
of giving active help. No expedition was sent 
by the State. But a general was nominated 
and appointed at a public assembly ; Corinthian 
citizens were allowed to volunteer for service. 
Finally seven ships were sent by the State, two 
being added to this number by Corcyra, 
another Corinthian colony, and one by Leucadia, 
also Corinthian in origin. But the greater part 
of the force that was raised were mercenaries. 
Something must be said about the general, who 
was one of the most remarkable figures in 
Greek history. 

Timoleon was a noble citizen of Corinth 
who had saved the liberties of his country by 
a terrible sacrifice, His elder brother Timo- 



ii2 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

phanes, an able and unscrupulous soldier, had 
established himself as a despot by help of a 
band of mercenaries who had been hired for 
the protection of the city against the threatened 
danger of Athenian invasion. Timoleon re- 
monstrated with him, but in vain. Then he 
resolved to free his country at any cost. He 
communicated his intention to two, one account 
says three, friends. They went together and 
asked for an interview with Timophanes. 
Timoleon addressed another appeal to his 
brother, and was contemptuously repulsed. 
His companions then drew their swords, for, 
thanks to their introducer, they had been per- 
mitted to enter the tyrant's presence with arms, 
and put Timophanes to death. Timoleon took 
no part in the deed, but stood apart, his face 
covered with his mantle and weeping bitterly. 
The act met with enthusiastic approval from 
the great majority of Corinthian citizens. 
Some who had looked for some personal gain 
from the favour of the despot, and in their 
hearts regretted his death, pretended to be 
shocked by the way in which it had been 
brought about. To Timoleon himself the 
event was the cause of the deepest and most 
permanent sorrow. He shut himself up in his 
house, took no part in public affairs, and 



THE DELIVERER FROM CORINTH 113 

refused the visits of his friends. The arrival 
of the Syracusan exiles delivered him from this 
miserable existence. At the Assembly held for 
the appointment of a general, name after name 
had been proposed in vain. The internal 
dissensions of Syracuse were so notorious at 
Corinth that no one was willing to undertake 
the thankless task of intervening in its affairs. 
Unexpectedly some one in the Assembly — it 
was thought at the time by a divine inspiration 
— proposed the name of Timoleon. It was 
received with general acclamation, and Timo- 
leon thankfully accepted the post. He con- 
trived to elude the Carthaginian squadron 
which was sent to watch him, and reached 
Sicily. Some four years were spent in re- 
storing order and freedom in the Greek cities. 
For some reason with which we are not 
acquainted, Carthage did not interfere with 
him whilst so engaged. War is said to have 
been precipitated by a violation of the Cartha- 
ginian territory. That it would certainly have 
broken out sooner or later may safely be 
affirmed. 

Carthage evidently made a great effort to 
bring the war to a successful issue. She 
seems to have been aware that circumstances 
were unusually favourable, for the Greek cities 

9 



ii4 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

of Sicily had never before been in so deplorable 
a condition of weakness. It was, indeed, a 
happy thing for the cause of freedom that so 
exceptionally able a man as Timoleon had the 
conduct of affairs. The army landed at Lily- 
baeum, under the command of Hasdrubal and 
Hamilcar, numbered 70,000. Of these, not 
less than 10,000 were native Carthaginians. 
Carthage was always sparing of the blood of 
her own citizens, preferring to buy even at 
lavish prices the valour and skill which she 
needed. On this occasion she raised an un- 
precedently large native force. They were 
equipped, too, in the most costly fashion. 
Each soldier was clothed in complete armour, 
much heavier and, therefore, more impenetrable 
than that usually worn. Each, too, had an 
elaborately ornamented breastplate. A corps 
d' elite, numbering 2,500, was the nucleus of 
the force. A fleet of two hundred ships of war 
accompanied the army, whose needs were 
supplied by a vast multitude of nearly a 
thousand transports. One important item in 
the war material was a number of chariots. 
The personal effects of the Carthaginian 
soldiers, many of whom belonged to the 
wealthiest families in the city, splendid tents 
and rich goblets and other plate for the table, 
were costly in the extreme. 



THE DELIVERER FROM CORINTH 115 

Timoleon could not raise more than 12,000 
men. He had 3,000 Syracusan citizens, an 
unknown number, possibly about 6,000, of 
volunteers from other Greek cities, and a 
force of mercenaries. His cavalry numbered 
one thousand. But he could not keep with 
him even the whole of these. When he had 
nearly reached the border of the Carthaginian 
territory there was a mutiny among the mer- 
cenaries. Their pay was considerably in 
arrears, and one of their officers took advantage 
of this fact to rouse them against the com- 
mander-in-chief. " He is taking you," he 
said, "on a desperate errand. You will have 
to encounter an enemy who can match every 
one of our soldiers with six of his own. 
And he does not even pay you your wages." 
Never did the strong personality of Timoleon 
show itself to more advantage. The mutineers 
got, in a way, all they wanted. They were 
sent back to Syracuse with instructions to 
the authorities at home that they were to be 
paid off at once, whatever it might cost to raise 
the money. 1 This concession seemed to put a 

1 It is difficult not to feel a certain satisfaction at 
knowing that the mutineers came to a bad end. They 
had a disreputable record, for they had taken the pay of 
the Phocians, knowing that it had been provided out of 



n6 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

premium on mutiny. Nevertheless, Timoleon 
by his personal influence succeeded in checking 
the movement. The troops that were left, 
when the discontented element was removed, 
followed him with unabated loyalty and courage. 
Marching westward into the heart of the 
Carthaginian territory, he reached the stream 
known as the Crimessus. 1 If he had before to 
contend against the avarice of his soldiers, he 
had now to deal with their fears. The army 
was encountered by some mules carrying loads 
of parsley. The men were dismayed at what 
they took as an unlucky omen, for parsley was 
commonly used for the garlands that are placed 
on tombs. Timoleon was equal to the occasion. 
" With this," he cried, seizing a sprig of the 

the sacred treasures of the temple at Delphi. On receiving 
their arrears they sailed to Southern Italy, where they 
attempted to form a settlement, were entrapped by the 
native inhabitants, and perished to a man. 

1 It is uncertain where this stream is to be located. 
Some geographers (Sir E. Bunbury among them, in the 
" Dictionary of Classical Geography ") suppose it to be a 
little river that flows into the sea near Castellamare ; by 
others it is identified with one that has its mouth on the 
south coast of the island, a few miles to the east of 
Selinus. This is the view taken by the author of the 
map recently published by Mr. John Murray, where the 
name is given to one of the upper tributaries of the Hypsas, 
now known as the Belici. 



THE DELIVERER FROM CORINTH 117 

herb, " we crown our conquerors in the Isthmian 
Games at home. It is our symbol of victory," 
and he put a chaplet on his own head and 
adorned his officers in the same way. The 
Greek army had now reached the brow of the 
hill which forms the eastern bank of the valley 
of the Crimessus. The whole country was 
covered with a mist, but there came up from 
the valley beneath a confused sound as of a 
great host in motion. Suddenly the mist 
lifted, and Timoleon saw below him the great 
Carthaginian army. The war-chariots had 
already crossed the river and were drawn up 
on the eastern shore ; the Carthaginian infantry, 
in their splendid armour, were in the very act 
of the passage ; pressing on their rear in a 
disorderly crowd was a multitude of mer- 
cenaries and native African levies. Timoleon 
saw his opportunity, and promptly seized it. 
He could never have so good a chance of 
delivering a successful attack on the enemy as 
when they were thus divided, some being 
actually in the river and some on the further 
shore. After a brief exhortation to his men, 
he led them down the steep slope to the river. 
The cavalry went first, and charged the native 
Carthaginians, who were just struggling out of 
the river and forming themselves in line on the 



n8 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

bank. But for a time they charged in vain. 
Indeed, they had to do their best to save them- 
selves from being broken up, for the chariots 
were driven furiously backwards and forwards 
among them. They could hardly keep their 
own lines ; on the lines of the enemy they made 
no impression. Timoleon then changed his 
plan. Recalling the cavalry, he sent it to 
operate on the flank of the enemy, while he 
proceeded to lead his infantry to a front 
attack. He took his shield from the attendant 
that carried it, and bade his men follow him. 
"He shouted to the infantry to be of good 
cheer and follow him," says Plutarch, " in 
a voice much louder than was his natural 
wont. It may have been the excitement of the 
conflict that lent it such a power, but the 
common belief at the time was " that some- 
thing divine was speaking through him." The 
work that they had to do required no little 
enthusiasm of courage. The Carthaginians 
were stout soldiers and splendidly armed. 
The spear availed little against them ; the 
Greeks had to get under their guard and 
assail them with the sword. At this critical 
point of the battle something happened which 
convinced Timoleon's soldiers that their leader 
had powers more than mortal on his side. 




TlMOLEON HOLDING THE FORD OF THE CRIMESSUS. 



THE DELIVERER FROM CORINTH 119 

The mist that had cleared away from the 
valley, and risen to the hilltop, now seemed 
to descend again in a furious storm. Besides 
the sound and sight of the thunder and the 
lightning — and there were but few spirits 
in that day hardy enough to despise these 
terrors — there was a blinding storm of rain 
and hail driven fiercely by a tempestuous wind 
into the faces of the Carthaginians. To the 
Greeks, who had it behind them, it caused 
little inconvenience. And then the river began 
to rise. The Carthaginians began to stagger 
under the weight of their heavy armour and 
saturated clothing, and when once a man had 
fallen there was no hope of his rising again. 
It was not long before the four hundred picked 
soldiers who formed the front ranks were cut 
down. These champions gone, the rest broke 
up and attempted to flee. This was almost 
impossible. Many were slain in the attempt ; 
many others were drowned ; and there were 
thousands of prisoners. Never before had 
such a blow fallen on Carthage. She lost, not 
as usual, the mercenaries whom it was easy to 
replace as long as her wealth held out, but 
her noblest sons. On the other hand, the 
Greeks, besides winning a very complete 
victory, gathered a spoil more magnificent 



i2o GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

than the most experienced campaigner had 
ever seen. 

Timoleon had not yet finished his work. 
He had still to put down the despots whose 
thrones were propped up by the power of 
Carthage, and Carthage was not inclined to 
give up her position in Sicily. In the course 
of the next year, however, the despots were 
all destroyed, and Carthage was glad to con- 
clude a peace. By this she bound herself 
to keep to the western side of the Halycus 
(Platani) and not to interfere with the internal 
affairs of the Greek cities. 

It is needless to continue in detail the story 
of the conflict between Greece and Carthage. 
The result was practically fixed by the victory 
of Timoleon at the Crimessus. Carthage did 
not indeed altogether abandon her ambition. 
She still coveted Sicily, still hoped, it may be, 
to acquire it, and came, once at least, as near 
to attaining to this end as she had ever done 
before. In 309 B.C. Syracuse had again lost 
the freedom which Timoleon had given back 
to her, and had fallen under the domination of 
one of the ablest and most unscrupulous in the 
long list of Sicilian tyrants, Agathocles. This 
man provoked a war with Carthage, but found 
himself unequal to his antagonist, and after a 



THE DELIVERER FROM CORINTH 121 

series of defeats was shut up in Syracuse. 
This city was, as it had been eighty-odd years 
before, the only place in the Island which the 
Greeks could call their own. Then Aga- 
thocles conceived a daring scheme. He would 
transfer the war to Africa, and attack Carthage 
at home, where, as he shrewdly perceived, her 
weakest points were to be found. An invader 
could always reckon upon the sympathy and 
support of the subject races, which suffered 
from the exacting rule of the Carthaginian 
government. Agathocles carried out his 
plan, and for a time achieved a brilliant 
success. He afterwards met with reverses, but 
his main object, the rescue of Sicily, was fully 
achieved. 

Agathocles died in 289 B.C. Pyrrhus, King of 
Epirus, famous for the victories which he won 
over Rome, was the next to take up the part of 
the leader of the Sicilian Greeks in their long 
struggle with Carthage. He accomplished 
little. In fact he spent two years only in the 
Island. The most memorable incident of his 
stay was that Carthage offered him alliance on 
most advantageous terms, and that he refused 
it unless she would agree to evacuate the Island. 
This was an honourable action, for the offer 
would have given him a most important advan- 



122 GREECE AND CARTHAGE 

tage- in the renewed attack upon Rome which 
he was planning. But the Sicilian Greeks 
showed little gratitude for his self-denial ; in 
fact, they became so hostile that he had no 
alternative left him but to leave the Island. 
"How fair a wrestling-ring," he is reported to 
have said as he took his last look of Sicily, 
" are we leaving to Rome and Carthage ! " 
With this departure of Pyrrhus, Greece, we 
may say, disappears from the scene, and Rome 
takes her part. Pyrrhus left Sicily in 276, and 
Rome came for the first time into collision with 
Carthage twelve years afterwards in what is 
called the First Punic War. These wars will 
be the subject of my Fourth Book. 



BOOK III 
GREECE AND PERSIA. THE ATTACK 

I. THE FIGHT ON THE RIVER 

ALL danger to Greece from Persian attack, 
so far as the mainland and the islands in 
the i^gean were concerned, practically ceased 
with the victory of Mycale\ But the Greek 
cities in Asia Minor were not safe. In the 
years 466-5 B.C. Cimon, son of Miltiades, the 
hero of Marathon, conducted operations in 
South-Western Asia Minor, which had for their 
object the expulsion of the Persians from 
certain Greek settlements in that region. In 
450 a formal convention was made which 
brought to an end, it may be said, the first act 
of the drama. The great king bound himself 
to leave the Asiatic Greeks free and untaxed, 
and not to send troops within a certain distance 
of the coast ; Athens, on the other hand, 



i2 4 GREECE AND PERSIA 

agreed to leave Persia in undisturbed posses- 
sion of Cyprus (though this island had a large 
Greek population) and of Egypt. 

The next period was one in which the rela- 
tions of Persia and Greece were largely deter- 
mined by the exigencies of Greek politics. 
The two great rivals for supremacy, Athens 
and Sparta, found Persian help, especially in 
the shape of gold, very useful ; and Persia, for 
her own purposes, played off the two against 
each other. There is an amusing scene in Aris- 
tophanes which illustrates this state of affairs. 
A pretended Persian envoy is introduced to the 
Assembly. He wears a mask which is made of 
one big eye, in token that he is the King's 
Eye, and mutters some gibberish which his 
introducer interprets as a promise to send 
some gold. The scene goes on : — 

"Tell them about the gold; speak louder 
and more plainly." 

The Eye spoke again : " Gapey Greeks, gold 
a fooly jest." 

"That is plain enough," cried a man in the 
Assembly. 

Ambassador. " Well, what do you make of 
it ? " 

Citizen. " Why, that it is a foolish jest for 
us Greeks to think that we shall get any gold." 



THE FIGHT ON THE RIVER 125 

Amb. " You're quite wrong. He didn't say 
'jest' but 'chest.' We are to get chests of 
gold." 

Cit. (turning to the Eye). "Now listen to 
me ; is the king going to send us any gold ? " 

Eye shakes his head. 

Cit. " Are the ambassadors cheating us ? " 

Eye nods. 

Cit. " Well, anyhow the creature knows how 
to nod in the right way." 

This humiliating state of things reached its 
worst in 387 B.C., when what was called the 
Peace of Antalcidas was concluded between 
Persia and Sparta. It is enough to quote one 
clause from the treaty, which, it should be said, 
all the Greek States agreed to accept, 

" King Artaxerxes thinks it just that the 
cities in Asia and the islands of Clazomense 
and Cyprus should belong to him. He thinks 
it just also to have all the other Hellenic cities 
autonomous, both small and great, except 
Lemnos, Imbros, and Scyros, which are to 
belong to Athens as they originally did. Should 
any parties refuse to accept this peace, I will 
make war upon them, along with those of the 
same mind, by land as well as by sea, with ships 
and with money." 

It looked as if all that had been won at 



126 GREECE AND PERSIA 

Marathon and Salamis had been lost, and Persia 
had become the arbiter of the fate of Greece. 
The Asiatic Greeks did lose what had been 
gained for them, for they fell again under the 
power of Persia. But these evils worked, in a 
way, their own cure. The States which had 
abused their power for selfish purposes fell, one 
after another, into the background, and others, 
which had not exhausted themselves in futile 
struggles for supremacy, came to the front. 
One of the claims which these new representa- 
tives of Greek feeling put forward was the 
resolve to exact vengeance — for this was the 
common form which the idea took — for the 
wrongs which Persia had done to Greece. 
At the same time there had been various reve- 
lations of the real weakness of the gigantic 
Empire which stretched from the Mediterranean 
to the Indian Ocean. The Expedition of the 
Ten Thousand, though it had failed of its 
immediate object of dethroning one prince in 
favour of another, had shown the immense 
superiority of the Greek race over its ancient 
enemy. Ten thousand men had marched into 
the very heart of Persia without meeting with a 
check, and had made their way back again 
under circumstances of almost incredible diffi- 
culty, without suffering anything like disaster. 



THE FIGHT ON THE RIVER 127 

Jason, tyrant of Pherse in Thessaly (d. 
370 b.c.) was the first, as far as we know, to 
form a definite scheme for the invasion of 
Persia. Thessaly I have had occasion but 
once only to mention. This was in de- 
scribing the battle of Plataea, when some 
cavalry from this region did good service to 
the Persians. It is strange to find in it 
the first advocate of what we may call the 
anti- Persian Crusade. But Jason had not the 
means to carry out so important a scheme. 
Anyhow, his career was cut short by assassin- 
ation. 

About a quarter of a century later we find 
the idea further developed. Its exponent is 
now the greatest rhetorician of the time, and 
the champion whose services are invoked is 
Philip of Macedon. About 346 b.c. Isocrates 
addressed a letter to Philip, who had recently 
been made president of the Amphictyonic 
Council, suggesting to him that he should 
reconcile the Greek States to each other and 
with their help wage war against Persia. The 
counsel was not offered, we may be sure, 
without a previous assurance that it would be 
welcome to the prince to whom it was given. 
Philip certainly cherished some such purpose. 
This was the ultimate object which he set 



128 GREECE AND PERSIA 

before himself in his struggle for supremacy in 
Greece. He even went so far as to make 
definite preparations for the enterprise. It 
may well be doubted whether he had genius 
enough for so gigantic an enterprise. It was 
not put to the test. His career also was cut 
short by the sword of the assassin. He was 
slain in 336 B.C., in the forty-seventh year of 
his age. Able as he was, he left a still abler 
successor the inheritance of his preparations 
and his plans. 

Alexander, who at his father's death was 
not quite twenty, had first to consolidate his 
position. He began by crushing his barbarous 
neighbours in the north ; he then stamped out 
a rebellion in Greece. This done he turned 
his attention to preparing his great plan. All 
was ready in less than two years. 

In April, 334, Alexander crossed the Helles- 
pont into Asia. He had about 35,000 men 
with him, one-seventh being cavalry. March- 
ing slowly eastwards, he came, a few weeks 
later (May 25th), on the Persian army, which 
was encamped on the eastern bank of the 
Granicus, a small stream which flows down 
from the Ida range into the Sea of Marmora. 
Of the Persian strength differing accounts are 



THE FIGHT ON THE RIVER 129 

given. The total probably exceeded that of 
Alexander's army. The proportion of cavalry 
to infantry was certainly much larger. The 
front line, indeed, which held the bank of the 
river, consisted wholly of this arm. On the 
right were the Medes and Bactrians, wearing 
the national dress, a round-topped cap, gaily- 
coloured tunic, and scale armour. In the 
centre, similarly accoutred, were the Paphla- 
gonians and Hyrcanians ; on the right was a 
small body of Greek horse, and the Persian 
cavalry proper, largely made up of men who 
claimed descent from the Seven Deliverers, 
the little company of nobles who delivered 
Persia from the sway of the false Smerdis. 1 
Here Memnon, the Rhodian, the ablest 
counsellor of King Darius, was in command. 
The infantry, both Asiatic and Greek, was 
posted in reserve, on the rising ground which 

r Cambyses, in a fit of frantic jealousy — so the story ran 
— had put his brother Smerdis to death. Cambyses died 
in Egypt. The magi, Median soothsayers and priests, 
contrived that one of their number should personate the 
murdered prince. After he had occupied the Persian 
throne for a few months, seven nobles conspired against 
him and slew him. One of the seven, Darius, became 
king ; the others were rewarded by perpetual immunity 
from taxes, for themselves and their descendants, and other 
privileges. 

10 



130 GREECE AND PERSIA 

marked the limit of the winter floods. The 
river was now flowing within its banks, but 
with a full, strong stream. 

Alexander, who was mounted on his famous 
charger Bucephalus, rode along the line, ad- 
dressing a few words of encouragement to 
each squadron and company as he passed it, 
and finally placed himself at the head of the 
right division of the army. As soon as the 
Persian leaders perceived his intention, they 
began to reinforce their own left. The fame 
of the king's personal prowess had not failed 
to reach them, and they knew that the fiercest 
struggle would be where he might be in 
immediate command. Alexander saw the 
movement and the opportunity which it offered 
him. He would have his antagonists at a 
disadvantage if he could catch them in the 
confusion of a change. Accordingly he ordered 
the whole line to advance, the right division 
being thrown somewhat forward. Here was a 
famous corps dUlite, a heavy cavalry regiment 
that went under the name of the " Royal 
Companions." This was the first to enter the 
river. A number of javelin-throwers and 
archers, on either side, covered their advance ; 
they were supported by some light horse and 
a regiment of light infantry. 



THE FIGHT ON THE RIVER 131 

The van of the attacking force made its way 
across the stream in fair order. The river-bed 
was rough, full of great stones brought down 
by floods and with here and there a danger- 
ously deep hole, but there was no mud or 
treacherous sand. The first assault was 
checked. A line of dismounted troopers stood 
in the water, wherever it was shallow enough 
to allow it ; on the bank itself was a mass of 
horsemen, two or three files deep. The com- 
batants below plied their swords ; those on 
the higher ground showered javelins on the 
advancing foe. Only a few of these could 
struggle up the somewhat steep bank ; of the 
few some were slain, others thrust back upon 
the troops that followed them. The attack 
seemed to have failed. But when the king 
himself took up the attack the fortunes of the 
day were rapidly changed. For the first of 
many times throughout his marvellous career 
the personal courage of Alexander, his strength, 
his dexterity in arms, turned the tide of battle. 
He was a matchless soldier as well as a match- 
less general, and seemed to combine the old 
soldiership and the new, the personal prowess 
of an Achilles and the tactical skill of an 
Epaminondas. He sprang forward, rallying, 
as he advanced, his disheartened troops, struck 



132 GREECE AND PERSIA 

down adversary after adversary, and climbed 
the bank with astonishing agility. The example 
of such a leader seemed to give the Companions 
an irresistible strength. In a few minutes the 
bank of the Granicus was won. But the battle 
was not yet over. The Persians had been 
beaten back from their first line of defence ; 
but they still held the level ground, and till 
the whole of the Greek army had crossed 
the stream they had a great superiority in 
numbers, enabling them to deliver charges 
which the weight of men and horses might 
well have made irresistible. Again Alexander 
was in the thick of the conflict. His pike had 
been broken in the struggle for the bank. He 
asked his orderly for another. The man 
showed him his own broken weapon. Then 
the king looked round to his followers, holding 
high the splintered shaft. The appeal was 
answered in an instant. It was a Corinthian, 
Demaratus by name, who answered his call 
and supplied him with a fresh lance. It was 
not done a moment too soon. The Persian 
cavalry charged in a heavy column, its leader, 
Mithradates, son-in-law to King Darius, riding 
a long way in front of his men. Alexander 
spurred his horse, charged at Mithradates with 
levelled pike, struck him in the face, and hurled 



THE FIGHT ON THE RIVER 133 

him dying to the ground. Meanwhile another 
Persian noble had ridden up. He struck a 
fierce blow at Alexander with his scymetar, but 
missing his aim in his excitement, did nothing 
more than shear off the crest of the helmet. 
Alexander replied with a thrust which broke 
through his breastplate and inflicted a mortal 
wound. There was a third antagonist behind, 
but his arm was severed by a sword-cut from 
a Macedonian officer just as he was in the act 
of delivering a blow. The struggle, however, 
was continued with unabated fury. It was not 
till almost every leader had fallen that the 
Persian cavalry gave way. 

Elsewhere in the field the victory was more 
easily won. The Uite of the Persian army 
had been brought together to oppose Alex- 
ander, and the remainder did not hold their 
ground with equal tenacity. When the phalanx 
had made its way across the river, and re- 
formed itself again on the eastern bank, it 
encountered no opposition. 

There still remained, however, a force to be 
dealt with which, had it been properly handled, 
might have been found a serious difficulty for 
the conquerors. The infantry, as has been said, 
was posted in reserve, and of this force not 
less than a half, numbering as many as ten 



134 GREECE AND PERSIA 

thousand, consisted of Greek mercenaries. 
These had remained in absolute inaction, idly- 
watching the struggle on the level ground 
below. They had no responsible leaders ; no 
orders had been issued to them. The Persian 
generals, confident in the strength of their 
special arm, the cavalry, neglected to make 
any use of this invaluable force. And yet they 
might have known what ten thousand Greeks, 
well led, could do ! Alexander came up and 
charged the unprotected flank of the Greek 
force. "He had the defects of his virtues," 
and was too eager in " drinking the delight of 
battle." His charger — not the famous Buce- 
phalus, which had fallen lame, but another 
horse — was killed, under him. The light 
infantry also delivered an attack, but the 
mercenaries still held their ground. But when 
the phalanx came up, their strength or their 
courage failed. The front ranks were crushed 
by the advance of the ponderous machine, and 
the rest first wavered, then broke up in hope- 
less confusion. Not less than half of their 
number were killed in their places or in the 
attempt to escape. The rest were either 
admitted to quarter, or contrived to make their 
way to some place of safety. 



II 



THE IRRESISTIBLE PHALANX 

THE eighteen months that followed the 
battle of the Granicus Alexander spent in 
Asia Minor. A few strong places resisted him, 
but on the whole he met with little opposition. 
On the other hand, he did not move very quickly. 
At Gordium, in Phrygia, he gave his army a 
long rest, and at Tarsus, in Cilicia, he was 
detained against his will by a severe illness, 
contracted, it was said, by bathing in the ice- 
cold waters of the Cydnus. Meanwhile Darius 
had been gathering together from all parts 
of the Empire a vast army which would be 
sure, he thought, to crush the invader. So 
confident did he feel that he did not attempt 
to check Alexander's advance. He feft the 
strong passes into Cilicia undefended. He 
did the same with the passes from Cilicia into 
Syria. He desired nothing better than that 



136 GREECE AND PERSIA 

the enemy should come to close quarters with 
him. His original plan was to wait for the 
Macedonian army at a place named Sochi, 
where there was a great expanse of level 
ground. Then he began to fear that Alexander 
might after all escape him. He left Sochi, and 
marched by one of the passes of Mons Amanus 
(Sawur Dagh) to Issus, where he would be in the 
rear of the enemy, and so be able to cut off the 
retreat which he believed would be attempted. 
Alexander, who had in the highest degree the 
faculty of guessing what his antagonist was 
thinking, saw his advantage. At Issus, Darius 
could not make use of his numbers, and so 
might be attacked with good hope of success. 
He made a night march, recrossed into Cilicia, 
and fought at Issus the second of his great 
battles. 

Darius took up his position on the north 
bank of the River Pinarus {Deli Tschai). The 
centre of his line of battle was composed of 
90,000 heavy-armed infantry, drawn up in three 
bodies of 30,000 each. One of these consisted 
of Greek mercenaries, and occupied the middle 
place ; on either side were the other two — 
Asiatics armed in Greek fashion. His own 
place was behind the Greeks. It was in them 
that he really trusted, though he had violently 



THE IRRESISTIBLE PHALANX 137 

resented the suggestion when it was made by 
another. Some weeks before, when reviewing 
the army with which he was about to encounter 
Alexander, he had asked for the opinion of 
Charidemus, an Athenian exile, who was in 
attendance on him. Charidemus was bidden 
to speak his mind freely, and he was imprudent 
enough to take the king at his word. The 
substance of his advice to the king was not 
to trust Asiatics, but to spend his accumulated 
treasure in hiring Greeks. Darius was deeply 
offended, and the great nobles about him were 
furious with rage. Charidemus was put to 
death, but his advice must have been followed. 
The cavalry was massed on the right wing — 
that end of the line which was nearest to the 
sea, for there alone was there any ground suit- 
able for their action. On the left wing, reaching 
far up the mountain-side, were twenty thousand 
light-armed infantry, who were to throw them- 
selves on the flank of the Macedonians as soon 
as these should attempt to cross the river. 
Behind this line of battle, numbering, it is pro- 
bable, not less than 120,000 men, stood a mixed 
multitude, swept together from all the provinces 
of the vast Persian Empire. This mass of 
combatants, if combatants they can be called, 
already unwieldy, received the addition of 



138 GREECE AND PERSIA 

50,000 troops, who had been posted on the 
southern bank of the river to cover the opera- 
tion of forming the Persian line, and who were 
brought back when the formation was com- 
pleted. The ground had been over-crowded 
before, and this addition to the numbers of the 
second line only made it more hopelessly- 
unmanageable. 

Alexander put his light infantry on the 
extreme right of his line, opposite, it will be 
remembered, to a similar force in the Persian 
array. Here also was the cavalry regiment of 
the " Companions," and with them some Thes- 
salian horse. The main line was composed of 
the phalanx in five divisions, the fifth, on the 
extreme left, being close to the sea, which was 
little more than a mile and a half from the foot 
of the mountains — so narrow was the space 
which Darius had chosen for a battlefield. He 
could have done nothing better calculated to 
destroy any advantage that might have been 
given by his vast superiority in numbers. On 
the left were some squadrons of Greek cavalry, 
and bodies of light-armed troops from Crete 
and Thrace. 

On coming in sight of the enemy Alexander 
made some changes in the disposition of his 
forces. The most important of these was to 



THE IRRESISTIBLE PHALANX 139 

transfer some light infantry, cavalry, and 
archers to act against the 20,000 Persians 
who had been so placed as to threaten his 
right flank. It was a wise precaution, but, 
as a matter of fact, it was not needed. The 
Persians made no move, and Alexander soon 
perceived that they might be safely neglected. 
He left a few hundred cavalry to watch them, 
and placed the rest of the force destined for 
this service in his main line. 

A brief time was allowed for rest when the 
river was reached. It was well, too, to wait 
for a possible forward movement on the part 
of the Persians. The confidence that had 
prompted the march to Issus might also prompt 
an attack. But the Persian line remained in 
its place, and Alexander crossed the stream. 
He had with him his light infantry, not slingers 
and archers, it should be explained, but regular 
soldiers, with armour and weapons so modified 
as to enable them to move quickly, the "Com- 
panions," and two divisions of the phalanx. 
The phalanx was drawn up in companies each 
sixteen deep. All the soldiers were armed 
with a pike (sarzssa), which was twenty-one 
feet in length. The pikes of the front rank 
projected fifteen feet, the other end being 
weighted so that the weapon could be held 



140 GREECE AND PERSIA 

without difficulty. The pikes of the second 
rank projected twelve feet, of the third, nine, 
of the fourth, six, of the fifth, three. The other 
ranks held their pikes in a slanting direction 
over the shoulders of those who stood in front. 
Alexander led the attack, as usual, in person. 
The Macedonians, moving as quickly as the 
phalanx could go, fell upon the Asiatic heavy - 
armed, who occupied the left division of the 
main Persian line. They were mainly Carduchi, 
the Kurds of to-day, better hands, it would 
seem, then as now, at plundering than at fighting. 
The Carduchi gave way, not waiting for the 
Macedonians to come to close quarters with 
them. Their flight endangered the safety of 
the king, or, rather, the king himself believed 
that it was endangered. He bade his charioteer 
turn the horses' heads and fly. As long as the 
ground allowed he kept to the chariot ; when 
it became too rough he sprang upon a horse, 
and fled in such haste that he threw away his 
royal mantle, his bow, and his shield. The 
mixed multitude that stood behind the main 
line of Persian battle, as soon as they saw the 
king quit the field, fled, or, rather, attempted 
to fly. But, so narrow was the space in which 
they had been crowded together, they could 
scarcely move. A scene of frightful terror and 



THE IRRESISTIBLE PHALANX 141 

confusion followed. The fugitives struggled 
fiercely with each other in the frantic attempt 
to escape. Had they shown as much energy 
in resisting the enemy as in thrusting aside 
and trampling down their friends, they might 
have changed the fortune of the day. In less 
than half an hour from the time when 
Alexander crossed the Pinarus the left wing 
of the Persian host was a hopeless mass of 
confusion. 

Yet the Persians had a still unbroken strength 
with which much might have been done, if only 
there had been a leader to make use of it. 
The Greeks in the centre stood their ground 
bravely. They even advanced, charged the 
left divisions of the phalanx, which had not 
completed the passage of the Pinarus, and 
inflicted some loss upon it, killing as many as 
150 of the front rank men, and the officer in 
command. But by themselves they could not 
hope to hold the field. When Alexander, 
wheeling round after his victorious assault on 
the Persian right, attacked them in flank, they 
were forced to give way. But they retired in 
good order, and the main body of them made 
good their escape. The Persian cavalry, too, 
had shown themselves not altogether unworthy 
of their ancient renown. They had actually 



142 GREECE AND PERSIA 

crossed the Pinarus, and charged the Thes- 
salian horse, which had been transferred, it 
should be said, by Alexander from the right 
to the left of his army. In the combat that 
ensued they held their own. But their courage 
failed when they became aware of the flight 
of Darius. When their king had given up 
the struggle what was there for them to stay 
for ? To him they were bound, but they had 
no conception of a country to whose service 
it was their duty to devote their lives. They 
fled, suffering greatly in the pursuit. 

The Macedonians lost 450 in killed, 
Alexander himself being slightly wounded. 
The slaughter among the Persians cannot be 
estimated. It was put down at more than 
100,000. Ptolemy, afterwards King of Egypt, 
who was one of Alexander's most trusted 
generals, declared that he found a ravine so 
choked with dead bodies that he could use 
them as a bridge. Ptolemy kept a diary of 
the war, which he afterwards embodied in a 
regular narrative. Arrian, who wrote the 
story of Alexander's campaign in the second 
century of our era, had this work before him. 



Ill 



THE ARMY OF THE HUNDRED PROVINCES 

DURING the twenty months which 
followed the victory of Issus, Alexander 
continued to make fresh conquests and to 
consolidate those already made. He subdued 
Syria — a name which must be taken to include 
both Phoenicia and Palestine. Here the two 
cities of Tyre and Gaza made an obstinate 
resistance, the two detaining him for no less 
than nine months. Egypt, which hated its 
intolerant Persian masters, gave itself up with- 
out a struggle. Early in 331 he heard that 
Darius had collected another huge army, with 
which to make another effort for his kingdom. 
The king had lost the western half of his 
dominions, but the eastern still remained to 
him, and from this he drew forces which 
exceeded in number even the great host which 

he had put into the field at Issus. The 

143 



144 GREECE AND PERSIA 

meeting-place was at Arbela, a place still known 
by the slightly changed name of Erbil, and 
situated on the caravan-route between Erzeroum 
and Bagdad ; but the actual battlefield must be 
looked for some twenty miles away in a level 
region known by the name of Gangamela. 

On the extreme right were the Medes, once 
the ruling people of Asia and still mindful of 
their old renown, the Parthian cavalry, and the 
sturdy mountaineers of the Caucasus ; on the 
opposite wing were the Bactrians — mostly 
hardy dwellers in the hills, and famous both for 
activity and for fierceness — and the native Per- 
sians, horse and foot, in alternate formation. But 
it was in the centre of the line, round the person 
of Darius, where he stood conspicuous on his 
royal chariot, that the choicest troops of the 
Empire were congregated. Here were ranged 
the Persian Horseguards — a force levied from 
the noblest families of the race that had ruled 
Western Asia for more than two centuries. 
They were known by the proud title of 
" Kinsmen of the King," and the Footguards, 
also a corps d'e'lite, who carried apples at the 
butt-end of their pikes. Next to these stood 
the Carians, probably a colony from the well- 
known people of that name in Asia Minor, 
possibly transported by some Persian king to 



THE ARMY OF THE HUNDRED PROVINCES 145 

a settlement in the East. Of all Asiatic races 
the Carians had shown themselves the most 
apt to learn the Greek discipline and to rival 
Greek valour. Next to the Carians, again, 
stood the Greek mercenaries. 

In front of the line were the scythed chariots, 
numbering two hundred in all, each with its 
sharp-pointed sides projecting far beyond the 
horses, and its sword-blades and scythes 
stretching from the yoke and from the naves 
of the wheels. (This is the first time that we 
hear of the scythed chariot. It was a device 
of a barbarian kind, and seldom, as far as we 
know, very effective.) Behind the line, again, 
was a large mixed multitude, drawn from every 
tribe that still owned the Great King's sway. 

Alexander saw that this time he had a 
formidable enemy to deal with. He had an 
entrenched camp constructed, as possibly useful 
in case of a reverse, and he consulted his 
generals— a course which he seldom followed 
— as to how an attack might be most advan- 
tageously delivered. But when one of his 
most experienced officers suggested an assault 
by night, he emphatically rejected the idea. 
It was, he declared, an unworthy stratagem ; 
victory so won would be worse than defeat. A 
more powerful reason was probably the danger 

11 



146 GREECE AND PERSIA 

of such an attempt. A night attack is always 
a desperate device. 

The first day after coming in sight of the 
enemy Alexander spent in preparation and 
consultation. On the morrow he drew out his 
order of battle. As usual he put himself at the 
head of the right wing. This was made up of 
the " Companions," the light infantry, and 
three out of the six divisions of the phalanx. 
The left wing, if it may be so called, for there 
was no centre, consisted of the rest of the 
plalanx, with a body of cavalry from the allied 
Greek states. 

And now, for the first time, Alexander had a 
second line in reserve. His numbers were 
considerably increased, the 35,000 with which 
he had crossed into Asia having now mounted 
up to nearly 50,000. And the nature of the 
battlefield made such an arrangement 
necessary. The enemy had an enormously 
superior force and it was necessary to guard 
against attacks on the flank and the rear. 
The second line consisted of the light cavalry, 
the Macedonian archers, contingents from 
some of the half-barbarous tribes which 
bordered on Macedonia, some veteran Greek 
mercenaries and other miscellaneous troops. 
Some Thracian infantry were detached to 
guard the camp and the baggage. 



THE ARMY OF THE HUNDRED PROVINCES 147 

The Persians, with their vastly larger 
numbers, were, of course, extended far beyond 
the Macedonian line. Left to make the attack, 
they might easily have turned the flank, or even 
assailed the rear of their opponents. Alexander, 
seeing this, and following the tactics which had 
twice proved so successful, took the offensive. 
He put himself at the head of the " Companions," 
who were stationed, as has been said, on the 
extreme right, and led them forward in person, 
still keeping more and more to the right, and 
thus threatening the enemy with the very move- 
ment which he had himself reason to dread. 
He thus not only avoided the iron spikes, which, 
as a deserter had warned him, had been set 
to injure the Macedonian cavalry, but almost 
got beyond the ground which the Persians had 
caused to be levelled for the operations of their 
chariots. Fearful at once of being outflanked 
and of having his chariots made useless, 
Darius launched some Bactrian and Scythian 
cavalry against the advancingenemy; Alexander, 
on the other hand, detached some cavalry of his 
own to charge the Bactrians, and the action 
began. 

The Bactrians commenced with a success, 
driving back the Greek horsemen. These fell 
back on their supports, and advancing again in 



148 GREECE AND PERSIA 

increased force, threw the Bactrians into 
confusion. Squadron after squadron joined 
the fray, till a considerable part of the 
Macedonian right and of the Persian left 
wing was engaged. The Persians were 
beginning to give way, when Darius saw, as 
he thought, the time for bringing the scythed 
chariots into action, and gave the word for 
them to charge, and for his main line to 
advance behind them. The charge was made, 
but failed, almost entirely, of its effect. The 
Macedonian archers and javelin - throwers 
wounded many of the horses ; some agile 
skirmishers even seized the reins and dragged 
down the drivers from their places. Other 
chariots got as far as the Macedonian line, but 
recoiled from the bristling line of outstretched 
pikes ; and the few whose drivers were lucky 
enough or bold enough to break their way 
through all hindrances were allowed to pass 
between the Macedonian lines, without being 
able to inflict any serious damage. Then 
Alexander delivered his counter attack. He 
ceased his movement to the right. Wheeling 
half round, the "Companions" dashed into the 
open space which the advance of the Bactrian 
squadrons had left in the Persian line. At the 
same time his own main line raised the battle- 



THE ARMY OF THE HUNDRED PROVINCES 149 

cry, and moved forward. Once within the 
enemy's ranks he pushed straight for the place 
where, as he knew, the battle would be decided, 
the chariot of the king. The first defence of 
that all-important position was the Persian 
cavalry. Better at skirmishing than at hand- 
to-hand fighting, it broke before his onslaught. 
Still there remained troops to be reckoned with 
who might have made the fortune of the day 
doubtful, the flower of the Persian foot and the 
veteran Greeks. For a time these men held 
their ground ; they might have held it longer, 
perhaps with success, but for the same cause 
which had brought about the disastrous result 
of Issus, the cowardice of Darius. He had been 
dismayed to see his chariots fail and his cavalry 
broken by the charge of the " Companions," and 
he lost heart altogether when the dreaded 
phalanx itself, with its bristling array of 
pikes, seemed to be forcing a way through the 
line of his infantry and coming nearer to 
himself. He turned his chariot and fled, the 
first, when he should have been the last, to 
leave his post. 

The flight of the king was the signal for a 

general rout, so far at least as the centre and 

left wing of the Persian army was concerned. 

It was no longer a battle ; it was a massacre. 



150 GREECE AND PERSIA 

Alexander pressed furiously on, eager to 
capture the fugitive Darius. But the very 
completeness of his victory, it may be said, 
hindered him. So headlong was the flight that 
the dust, which, after the months of burning 
summer heat, lay thick upon the plain, rose 
like the smoke of a vast conflagration. The 
darkness was as the darkness of night. Nothing 
could be seen, but all around were heard the 
cries of fury and despair, the jingling of the 
chariot wheels, and the sound of the whips 
which the terrified charioteers were plying 
with all their might. 

Nor was Alexander permitted to continue 
the pursuit. Though the Persian left, demora- 
lised by the cowardice of the king, had fled, the 
right wing had fought with better fortune. It 
was under the command of Mazseus, who was 
probably the ablest of the Persian generals, and 
knew how to use his superiority of numbers. 
Whilst the sturdy Median infantry engaged the 
Macedonian front line, Mazseus put himself 
at the head of the Parthian horse and charged 
the flank. Parmenio, Alexander's ablest lieu- 
tenant — his one general, as he was reported 
to have said — who was in command, sent an 
urgent request for help, so hard pressed did he 
find himself to be. Alexander was greatly 






THE ARMY OF THE HUNDRED PROVINCES 151 

vexed, for he saw that all chance of capturing 
Darius was lost, but he knew his business too 
well to neglect the demand. He at once called 
back his troops from the pursuit, and led them 
to the help of the left wing. Parmenio had 
sent the same message to that division of 
the phalanx which had taken part in the 
advance of the right wing. 

As things turned out, however, the help was 
hardly needed. On the one hand, the Thes- 
salian cavalry had proved themselves worthy of 
their old reputation as the best horsemen in 
Greece. Held during the earlier part of the 
engagement in reserve, they had made a bril- 
liant charge on the Parthians, and had restored 
the fortune of the day. And then, on the other 
hand, Mazaeus and his men had felt the same 
infection of fear which the flight of Darius had 
communicated to the rest of the army. Par- 
menio felt the vigour of the enemy's attack 
languish, though he did not know the cause, 
and had the satisfaction of regaining, and more 
than regaining, the ground which he had lost, 
before the reinforcements arrived. 

The day was virtually over, yet the hardest 
fighting of the battle was yet to take place. 
The Parthian cavalry, with some squadrons of 
Persian and Indian horse among them, encoun- 



152 GREECE AND PERSIA 

tered, as they retreated across the field of 
battle, Alexanderhimself and the " Companions." 
Their only hope of escape was to cut through 
the advancing force. It was no time for 
tactics, only for a desperate charge for life. 
Each man was fighting for himself, and he 
fought with a fury that made him a match even 
for Macedonian discipline and valour. And 
the enemy had among them some of the most 
expert swordsmen in the world. Anyhow, the 
" Companions" suffered more severely than they 
did in any other engagement in the war. 
Sixty were slain in the course of a few minutes, 
three of the principal officers were wounded, 
and even Alexander himself was in serious 
danger. But the Parthians thought only of 
saving their lives, and when they once saw the 
way clear before them they were only too glad 
to follow it. 

The Persians achieved one more success. 
A brigade of Indian and Persian horse had 
plunged through a gap which the movement of 
the phalanx had left in the line, and attacked 
the camp. The Thracians who guarded it 
were hampered by the number of the prisoners 
whom they had to watch. Many of these 
escaped. The mother of Darius — the effort 
had been made for her — might have been one 




THE ARMY OF THE HUNDRED PROVINCES 153 

of them, but she refused to go. By this time 
some troops had come to the rescue of the 
camp, and the Persian cavalry had to fly. 

The great battle of Arbela was over. It 
was the most hardly won as it was the most 
conclusive of all Alexander's victories. The 
Persians made no further stand. The great 
enemy of Greece had disappeared from the 
stage of history. But we shall find the powerful 
forces which Persia represented appear again in 
another shape. 



BOOK IV 
ROME AND CARTHAGE 

I. THE 'SERVANTS OF MARS 

I HAVE had to speak more than once of 
mercenary troops employed by the Greek 
cities in Sicily to help them in their long 
struggle with Carthage. The use of such 
troops was a regular practice with Carthage ; 
it was only on great occasions that this State 
put its own citizens in the field. With the 
Greeks, on the contrary, it was the exception 
to employ any but citizen soldiers. The mer- 
cenary was suspected, and not without reason, 
of being a ready instrument in the hands of 
any unscrupulous person who might be seeking 
to establish a tyranny. As time went on, how- 
ever, he became more and more a necessity. 
As society became more complex, the citizen 

found himself less willing to bear arms and less 

154 



THE SERVANTS OF MARS 155 

capable of doing it. And the exhaustion 
caused by almost incessant wars made it 
necessary to seek elsewhere for men who 
should fill up the depleted ranks. Hence the 
employment of mercenaries even by free cities. 
Whatever their use in time of war, these 
auxiliaries were naturally difficult to manage or 
dispose of when peace had . been restored. 1 
Such certainly the Syracusans found to be the 
case with a body of Italian mercenaries whom 
Agathocles 2 had had in his service. They 
were paid off and peremptorily ordered to 
return home. This prospect was not agree- 
able ; it meant a return to regular and not 
very profitable labour ; they greatly preferred 
to live by the sword. They professed, how- 
ever, to be willing to obey the command, and 
accordingly marched in the direction of Italy, 
intending, it appeared, to be ferried across the 
Straits of Messana. Whether they had fixed 
on any settled plan, or yielded to the sudden 
attraction of a chance that seemed to offer 



1 Xenophon gives in the later books of the Anabasis a 
graphic description of the troubles that arose when the 
" Ten Thousand," or such as were left of them (between 
eight and nine thousand), had made their way to the coast, 
and were looking out for employment. 

2 See pp. 120-21. 



156 



ROME AND CARTHAGE 



itself, cannot be determined. What we know 
is that when they reached Messana, from 
which they were to have embarked, and had 
been imprudently invited within the walls by 
its citizens, they seized the town with all that 
it contained. Here they established them- 
selves, taking the name of Mamertini, or 
" Servants of Mars " (Mamers was the Oscan 
name for the deity known to the Romans as 
Mars). A similar body held the adjacent 
mainland, and the two, joined as they were by 
an informal alliance of interests, became a 
formidable power. They practically lived by 
robbery by land and sea, and their existence 
became an intolerable nuisance to the two 
powers that shared Sicily between them. For 
once the interests of Syracuse and Carthage 
were identical. The Syracusan troops inflicted 
a severe defeat on the Mamertini, and, with 
the help of their new allies, closely besieged 
their town. 

The Mamertini had for some time perceived 
that they could not stand alone, but must take 
sides either with Rome or with Carthage. 
They were divided as to the choice, but cir- 
cumstances inclined them to Rome, and they 
sent envoys asking for protection and help. 
The Senate, to whom this application was 



THE SERVANTS OF MARS 157 

addressed, were not a little perplexed. They 
had just inflicted a severe punishment on a 
body of mercenaries who had done at Rhegium 
exactly the same thing that the Mamertini had 
done at Messana. They postponed the matter 
more than once, possibly in the hope that the 
necessity of deciding might pass away. But 
the General Assembly of the People, to whom 
the Senate referred the matter — this dual 
government had at times its convenience — was 
not disposed to be so indifferent. A resolution 
was passed that the Mamertini were to be 
helped, and Appius Claudius, one of the 
Consuls of the year, was sent in command 
of an expedition. 

When he arrived, he found the situation 
considerably changed. There was a Car- 
thaginian as well as a Roman party among the 
Mamertini, and the former had now gained the 
upper hand. A Carthaginian fleet was in the 
harbour and a body of Carthaginian troops in 
possession of the citadel. Fortunately for 
Rome, there was no one of energy or deter- 
mination to manage affairs. The officer in 
command of the fleet was seized by the pro- 
Roman faction, and Hanno, who was in charge 
of the citadel, consented to evacuate it, if he 
were allowed to withdraw with the honours of 



158 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

war. Rome became possessed of Messana 
without having to strike a blow. She never 
lost it — it was not her way to lose what she 
had once gained — and she found it a most 
valuable position. But the acquisition of 
Messana meant war with Carthage. Carthage 
began by crucifying the unlucky general who 
had abandoned the citadel, and then, entering 
into close alliance with Hiero, invested the 
city. Appius Claudius made proposals for 
peace, which were not accepted. Then he 
made a sally from the town and inflicted such 
a defeat on the enemy that they raised the 
siege. The next year Hiero, who had the 
sagacity to see that Rome would be a more 
useful ally than Carthage, changed sides. 
Rome had its foot down in Sicily and never 
took it up. 



II 



FOR THE RULE OF THE SEA 

I AM not going to tell the whole story of the 
Punic Wars. In each of them, however, 
there is something that belongs to my subject. 
In the First, with which I am now concerned, 
there is the extraordinary effort by which the 
Romans put themselves in a position to con- 
tend with Carthage for the dominion of the 
sea. There is nothing quite like it in history, 
and nothing, one might say, which more 
plainly showed the wonderful fitness of the 
nation for its great destiny of ruling the world. 
Polybius, one of the most thoughtful and 
judicious of ancient historians, becomes enthu- 
siastic in his praise of this marvellous effort. 
He says: "There could be no more signal proof 
of their courage, or rather audacity. They 
had no resources at all for the enterprise ; they 

had never even entertained the idea of a naval 

159 



i6o 



ROME AND CARTHAGE 



war — indeed it was the first time they had 
thought of it — but they engaged in the enter- 
prise with such daring that, without so much 
as a preliminary trial, they took upon them- 
selves to meet the Carthaginians at sea, on 
which they had held for generations an undis- 
puted supremacy." The first thing, of course, 
was to build the ships. They had not even a 
model to copy, till one of the Carthaginian 
men-of-war happened to run aground, and so 
fell into their hands. And while the ships 
were being built the crews which were to man 
them were being exercised. Sets of rowers' 
benches were constructed on dry ground ; the 
crews sat on them as they would have to sit in 
actual vessels. In the middle the fugleman, 
as we may call him, was stationed. As he 
gave the signal, they stretched their bodies and 
arms forwards, and drew them back again, all 
in time. By the time the ships were finished, 
the crews were as ready as this kind of 
teaching could make them. A little practice 
in actual rowing on the sea was given them, 
and then the new fleet entered upon its first 
naval campaign. 

The first experience of the new force was 
not encouraging. A squadron of seventeen 
ships under one of the Consuls for the year, a 



FOR THE RULE OF THE SEA 161 

Scipio, great-uncle of a famous man of whom 
I shall have to speak hereafter, was shut up in 
the harbour of Lipara, and had to surrender. 
The other Consul was put in command of the 
fleet and at once set about suiting it better to 
the actual conditions of warfare. He had the 
sagacity to see that there was more in seaman- 
ship than could be acquired by a landsman in a 
few weeks, and the object that he set before 
himself was that seamanship should not be 
allowed to count for more than could possibly 
be helped. To put the matter shortly, a battle 
on sea was to be made as like to a battle on 
land as could be managed. He adopted 
accordingly the suggestion of an ingenious 
inventor that the ships should be fitted with 
boarding-machines, or "crows" (corvi), as they 
afterwards came to be called. The actual 
" crow " was a gangway, four feet wide and 
thirty-six feet long, with a wooden railing on 
either side, about the height of a man's knee. 
This construction was fastened to a pole, some 
twenty-four feet high, that was placed near the 
bowsprit. It was fitted with pulleys and ropes 
so that it could be dropped at pleasure in any 
direction that might be convenient. When it 
was dropped to the deck of a hostile ship it 
acted as a grappling-iron, for it was fitted with 

12 



162 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

a heavy spike which ran into the timber. If 
the two ships came together side by side the 
boarders could scramble over the bulwarks, 
and the chief use of the machine was for grap- 
pling. If they met prow to prow the gangway, 
which was broad enough for two men to pass 
over it abreast, became very useful. 

When this equipment was complete, Duilius 
boldly put to sea, sailing for a spot on the 
north coast of Sicily where the Carthaginians 
were busy plundering. As soon as the Roman 
fleet came in sight the Carthaginian admiral — 
one of the many Hannibals who figure in these 
wars — manned his ships, and went out of 
harbour to meet it. He was superior in num- 
bers, having 130 ships, while the Romans 
could have had but few over 100 (they had 
built 1 20 and had lost 1 7). But it was on his 
superiority in seamanship that he most relied. 
For the Romans as sailors he had, and not 
without reason, a profound contempt. So 
strong was this feeling of superiority that he 
did not take ordinary pains in keeping his ships 
in order. " He advanced," says Polybius, "as 
though he was about to seize an easy prey." 
He and his officers saw the " crows," and could 
not make out what they meant. That there 
was anything dangerous about them no one 



FOR THE RULE OF THE SEA 163 

seems to have imagined, for the Carthaginian 
captains that led the van of the fleet charged 
straight at their antagonists. When they 
came to close quarters they made a very dis- 
comfiting discovery. Any ship that came into 
contact with a Roman vessel was immediately 
grappled ; no sooner had it been grappled than 
it was boarded by a number of armed men, 
and became the scene of a conflict that was 
practically the same as if it were being fought 
on dry land. The Carthaginian crews were 
not prepared for this ; it is not improbable 
that they were insufficiently armed, for they 
counted on ramming and sinking their antago- 
nists. Thirty ships were captured in this way; 
the rest of the fleet sheered off when they saw 
what had happened to the van, and tried to 
manoeuvre, taking the enemy, if possible, at a 
disadvantage. They were able, however, to 
affect little or nothing. If they were to do any 
damage to the enemy, they had, sooner or 
later, to come into contact with him. But this 
contact was very likely to be fatal. The 
" crow " was promptly dropped, and the 
dreaded Romans had to be encountered. 
Twenty more ships were thus lost, and the 
rest were glad enough to make their escape. 
This victory was undoubtedly a great 



164 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

achievement, and Rome did not fail to appre- 
ciate it properly. The Consul Duilius became 
at once one of the most famous of Roman 
heroes. He did not perform, possibly had no 
opportunity of performing, any other service 
of much importance, but the victory of Mylae 
established his reputation for ever. A story is 
told of the privileges accorded to him in his 
old age. He had a fancy for being attended 
by a couple of flute players when he was 
returning home from an entertainment, and 
though the practice was thought inconsistent 
with the simplicity of Roman manners, his 
fellow-citizens endured it with patience in con- 
sideration of the singular service which he had 
rendered to his country. 

Nor was the victory at Mylae a solitary 
success. Four years afterwards there was 
another great sea-fight at Heraclea, * on the 
south coast of Sicily. The Romans had deter- 
mined to adopt a policy which, as we have 
seen, had been previously followed with success, 
and to attack Carthage on her own territory. 
A very large fleet was collected or constructed 
to carry out this purpose. There were, accord- 
ing to Polybius, 33° ships, each carrying on an 

1 The battle is sometimes spoken of as the battle of 
Ecnomus. 



FOR THE RULE OF THE SEA 165 

average 300 rowers and sailors and 120 soldiers 
or marines. This gives a total of nearly 
140,000, a huge number which Polybius 
mentions with astonishment, but apparently 
without disbelief. The Carthaginian fleet, 
which numbered 350 men-of-war, prepared to 
dispute the passage. 

The battle that followed was fiercely con- 
tested. The description that Polybius gives of 
it is not easy to understand, but the main 
features are clear enough. In manoeuvring the 
Carthaginians more than held their own. 
Whatever success they won was due to the 
rapidity and skill with which they moved ; but 
they could not contend on equal terms with 
their antagonists when they had to come to 
close quarters. " Over thirty " of their ships 
were sunk. Polybius does not give, doubtless 
because he could not ascertain, a more definite 
figure, while the Romans lost twenty-four. So 
far there was no great disparity. But, on the 
other hand, sixty-four Carthaginian men-of-war 
were captured, whereas not a single Roman 
ship was taken. Plainly, when the "crows" 
could be brought into use, and the struggle 
between ship and ship was decided by hand-to- 
hand fighting, the old Roman superiority 
declared itself. 



Ill 



THE MARTYR PATRIOT 



THE two Consuls of the year were in com- 
mand of the fleet at Heraclea, and the his- 
torian attributes some of the energy and deter- 
mination with which the battle was fought to the 
encouragement of their presence. The junior 
of the two, M. Atilius Regulus, is one of the 
most romantic heroes of Roman story, and it 
is impossible not to give a short account of the 
rest of his career. It was by an accident, the 
death of the duly elected Consul of the year 
very shortly after his coming into office, that 
Regulus happened to share the command of 
the expedition to Africa. But he had held the 
Consulship before, and had then so distinguished 
himself — he had in fact the glory of completing 
the Roman conquest of Italy — that he had 
obtained the honour of a triumph. After the 
victory at Heraclea, he effected a successful 



THE MARTYR PATRIOT 167 

landing on the African coast. The departure 
of his colleague, who was summoned home, 
left him in sole command. Aided by an insur- 
rection of the native tribes, always ready to 
revenge themselves on their oppressive masters, 
he reduced Carthage to great straits. That 
haughty State even brought itself to ask for 
peace. Regulus demanded such conditions — 
what they were we are not told — that the 
Carthaginians unanimously resolved to bear 
any extremity of suffering rather than submit 
to them. 

And now there was a change of fortune. It 
came with dramatic suddenness, and signally 
illustrated the aphorism which the moralists of 
antiquity repeated with such frequency and 
emphasis, "pride goeth before a fall." The 
Carthaginian recruiting agents, when they 
visited Greece, found a man who was admir- 
ably suited for their purpose. Xanthippus was 
one of those Spartan soldiers of fortune who 
in several conspicuous instances affected the 
course of history. It was the Spartaji Gylippus 
who saved Syracuse when it was almost in the 
grasp of Athens ; and now it was another 
Spartan who at least prolonged for a century 
the existence of Carthage. Xanthippus had, 
it would seem, taken service in some subordi- 



ROME AND CARTHAGE 



nate capacity as an officer of mercenaries. He 
was an acute observer, and saw that the 
resources of Carthage were but ill employed. 
In the two arms of elephants and cavalry her 
army was so superior to the Romans that 
defeat could not but be the result of mis- 
management. These opinions, freely expressed 
to his comrades, came round before long to the 
ears of the authorities. Xanthippus was sum- 
moned before them ; he explained his views 
and pointed out some changes in the manage- 
ment of the campaign which it would be neces- 
sary to make. His hearers were greatly 
impressed by the force and clearness of his 
statement, and gave him what was probably a 
provisional command of the army. He had 
now the opportunity of showing his military 
abilities. He began by manoeuvring bodies of 
troops, and showed such tactical skill as to 
excite the admiration of the men. They loudly 
demanded to be led against the enemy, stipula- 
ting that the leader should be Xanthippus. It 
is needless to describe the battle which followed. 
The hundred elephants which Xanthippus put 
in part of his line were used to good effect. 
They did not actually break the Roman legions, 
but they inflicted a great deal of damage, and 
prepared the way for the infantry behind them. 



THE MARTYR PATRIOT 169 

In cavalry the Carthaginian army was so much 
stronger than the Roman — four thousand, we 
are told, to five hundred — that there was 
practically no conflict. In the end the army 
of Regulus was nearly annihilated. Two 
thousand men made good their retreat to the 
town of Aspis on the coast ; five hundred, 
among whom was the Consul himself, were 
taken prisoners ; the rest, more than twelve 
thousand in number, perished on the field of 
battle. 

For five years Regulus remained in captivity. 
Then — so runs the story — he was sent to Rome 
in company of some ambassadors who were to 
propose a treaty of peace. It was expected of 
him that he should do his best to recommend 
the proposal to his countrymen ; his release 
was to be the reward of his help. But Regulus 
had very different views of the situation. He 
thought that peace, at least on any such terms 
as Carthage was willing to accept, would not be 
for the interest of Rome, and he determined to 
oppose. He asked permission to speak; his right 
to deliver an opinion as a member of the Senate 
he considered himself to have lost by having 
fallen into the hands of the enemy. Leave 
granted, he delivered an oration in which he 
did his best to dissuade his countrymen from 



170 



ROME AND CARTHAGE 



making 
was 



peace, 



and succeeded. But his success 



fatal 



»t only to his chances of liberty, but 
to his life. He was taken back to Carthage, 
and there — so the story has it — put to death 
by cruel tortures. The tale is told by many 
writers, but Polybius, who is by far the best 
authority for events of the time, is absolutely 
silent about it, and his silence, in view of the 
strong feeling in favour of the Romans which 
is noticeable in him, is a very important con- 
sideration. According to another story, which 
seems to have as little or as much foundation, 
the Senate handed over to the widow of 
Regulus two noble Carthaginian prisoners. 
The woman, in revenge for her husband's 
death, treated them with such barbarity that, 
for very shame, the Senate took them out of 
her hands. Perhaps we shall be justified in 
regarding both legends as specimens of that 
wonderful crop of inventions which springs up 
whenever the feelings of a nation are greatly 
roused by the agitations of war. 

This was not the only loss that Rome 
suffered during the latter part of the war. She 
lost one fleet by a storm, and another by the 
folly of its commander. This man was one of 
the Claudian family, a house which showed more 
ability in politics than in war. He seems to 



THE MARTYR PATRIOT 171 

have fallen into the mistake of underrating 
the enemy, made an attack upon them from 
which he was compelled to withdraw, and when 
he saw that the day was lost, made his own 
escape with a discreditable precipitancy. The 
battle was fought in and outside the harbour of 
Drepanum, a town in the extreme west of the 
Island. Claudius was indicted on his return to 
Rome, heavily fined, and thrown into prison. 
He is said to have committed suicide. In later 
writers we find a story which has something of 
the look of having been invented to point a 
moral. It was represented to him on the 
morning of the battle by the keepers of the 
sacred chickens, that the sacred birds, whose 
conduct was held to foretell the future, would 
not eat. This was a most sinister sign. The 
insolent soldier received the intimation with 
contempt. " If they won't eat," he cried, 
" they shall at least drink ! " and he gave 
orders that they should be thrown into the sea. 
It is certainly, whether true or not, a character- 
istic illustration of the arrogance of the Clau- 
dian family. Such, too, is the other story 
which supplements it. Some years afterwards 
a sister of the unlucky or impious general was 
greatly incommoded by the crush of people 
coming out of the amphitheatre. " I wish," she 



172 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

cried, " that my brother were alive again, and 
would take another fleet to Sicily, and ease us 
of some of this superfluous crowd." She was 
fined for her incivility, the use of language 
unbecoming a citizen. 

In B.C. 241 this long war at last came to an 
end. Both sides had suffered fearfully both in 
men and means. The Romans lost 700 ships 
of war and the Carthaginians about 200 less, 
for though they had not shown themselves a 
match for their antagonists in fighting, they 
knew better how to deal with bad conditions of 
weather. The Romans had a way of going 
straight to their point, whatever obstacles were 
in their way. Storm or no storm, they went 
on, and the result of their obstinacy was often 
not a little disastrous. 1 

On the whole the balance of success was 
considerably in favour of Rome, and the con- 
ditions of the peace showed a distinct gain. 
The most important article was the total 
withdrawal of Carthage from Sicily. For more 
than three centuries she had renewed her 



1 We may compare the way in which they made their 
great military roads. These went by the nearest way 
from point to point, not engineered according to modern 
practice. 



THE MARTYR PATRIOT 173 

attempts to possess herself of the Island. Now 
she was compelled to definitely renounce her 
ambition. This renunciation marks an im- 
portant stage in the history of the world. 



IV 



THE SONS OF LIGHTNING 

THE later years of the First Punic War 
had brought to the front a man of 
extraordinary genius, Hamilcar, surnamed 
Barca. 1 As his son, Hannibal, was born in this 
very same year, we may safely put his age at 
twenty-five. Hamilcar kept the Romans in 
check, first at Ercte, a stronghold in Sicily, and 
afterwards at Eryx in the same island, for five 
years, and might have even changed the course 
of the war if he could have been adequately 

1 "Barca " is equivalent to the Hebrew Barak, and means 

" lightning." We may compare the surname of Boajterges, 

"Sons of Thunder," given by Christ to the sons of Zebedee. 

In 247 B.C. he was appointed to the chief command of the 

forces of Carthage, being then " a very young man," if we 

may so translate the term adolescentidus which Livy applies 

to him. This word, however, is very vague. It covers 

any age from eighteen to upwards of thirty. Cicero, for 

instance, uses it of Caesar at the age of thirty-two. 

174 



THE SONS OF LIGHTNING 175 

supported from home. So greatly did his 
military ability impress the Romans that when 
negotiations for peace were commenced, he was 
permitted to march out of Eryx with all the 
honours of war. During the next four years 
he rendered the greatest service to his country, 
which had been brought to the very verge of 
ruin by the revolt of the mercenaries. It was 
Hamilcar, in fact, who saved Carthage from 
destruction. This done, he devoted the 
remainder of his life to the working out of a 
great scheme which was to restore his country 
to the commanding position from which she 
had been deposed by the disasters of the First 
Punic War. Sicily had been lost ; another 
province, far larger, and possibly more valuable, 
might be found in Spain. Carthage had had 
for several generations a large trade with Spain, 
and probably possessed some trading ports or 
fortified factories on the southern coast. 
Hannibal crossed over into Spain with a 
general commission to do what he could for 
the interests of Carthage in that country. We 
know next to nothing about the details of his 
action, but it is clear that he was eminently 
successful. He practically conquered a con- 
siderable part of Spain, and did it without any 
charge on the home revenues, which, indeed, 



176 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

were largely augmented by the sums which he 
sent home. After a prosperous career of nearly 
nine years he fell in battle. This was 229 B.C., 
when he was little more than forty years of age. 
His work was taken up by his son-in-law, Has- 
drubal. Hasdrubal was, by all accounts, more 
of a politician than a soldier. The interests of 
Carthage, however, were furthered rather than 
hindered by this difference of character. 
Hamilcar had impressed the Spanish tribes by 
his military genius and resources. Hasdrubal 
conciliated them. His wife was the daughter 
of a Spanish chief. Altogether he did much 
to consolidate the Carthaginian power in the 
Peninsula. Not the least of his services was 
his foundation of New Carthage, a place 
admirably chosen for strength of position and 
convenience of access. After eight years of 
rule he was assassinated by a slave whose 
master he had put to death. 

The successor of Hasdrubal was the son of 
Hamilcar, a son who possessed a military genius 
even greater than that of his father. Han- 
nibal is ranked by common consent among the 
greatest generals of the world. If Rome could 
have been overthrown by any enemy, it would 
have been by him, so brilliant was his strategy, 
so great his capacity for leadership — nothing is 



THE SONS OF LIGHTNING 177 

more remarkable in his career than his power 
of giving unity to the varied components of a 
mercenary army — and so resolute his hostility 
to Rome. He himself narrated towards the 
close of his life the incident which seems to 
have made this feeling the dominant motive of 
his life. He was then in exile, and the guest 
of Antiochus the Great, King of Syria. Some 
jealous courtiers had suggested to Antiochus 
that Hannibal was not indisposed to come to 
terms with Rome. He then told his story. 

" When my father was about to go on his 
expedition to Spain, I was nine years old. I 
was standing near the altar when he made the 
usual sacrifice to Zeus. This successfully per- 
formed, he bade all the other worshippers stand 
back, and calling me to him, asked me whether 
I wished to go with him. I gave an eager 
assent, and begged him most earnestly to take 
me. On this he took me by the right hand, led 
me up to the altar, and bade me lay my hand 
upon the victim, and swear eternal enmity to 
Rome." 

No vow was ever more faithfully per- 
formed. 

Of Hannibal's early years we know but little. 
He was present at the battle in which his father 
was killed, being then in his nineteenth year. 

13 



178 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

During the period of his brother-in-law's com- 
mand he was continuously employed on active 
service. Hasdrubal's ability, as has been 
already said, was political rather than military, 
and the operations in the field were largely 
conducted by the younger man, and conducted 
with conspicuous success. His habit of victory 
and his great personal qualities made him the 
favourite of the army. Livy gives us a vivid 
picture of the man as he was in his youth. 

" Bold in the extreme in incurring peril, 
he was perfectly cool in its presence. No toil 
could weary his body or conquer his spirit. 
Heat and cold he bore with equal patience. 
The cravings of nature, not the pleasure of the 
palate, determined the measure of his food and 
drink. His waking and sleeping hours had 
no relation to day and night. Such time as 
business left him, he gave to repose, but it was 
not on a soft couch or in stillness that he sought 
it. Many saw him, wrapped in his military cloak, 
lying on the ground amidst the sentries and 
pickets. His dress was not one whit superior 
to that of his comrades, but his accoutrements 
and his horses were conspicuously splendid. 
Of all the cavalry and the infantry, he was by 
far the first soldier, earliest to join the battle 
and last to leave it." 



THE SONS OF LIGHTNING 179 

The quarrel with Rome, undoubtedly pro- 
voked of set purpose by Hannibal, began with 
his attack on Saguntum (now Murviedro, i.e., 
Muri Veteres, " The Old Walls," in Valencia). 
This town was in alliance with the Romans, 
who sent envoys to Hannibal bidding him desist 
from the attack, and to Carthage, complaining 
of their general's action. Hannibal refused to 
receive the embassy ; at Carthage the answer 
given was practically a refusal to interfere. 
Meanwhile Saguntum was left without help. 
When it fell, after a siege of several months, the 
Romans felt that war was inevitable, and made 
preparations for carrying it on with vigour. 
They probably under-estimated the strength of 
the enemy. The army voted, largely made up, 
it must be remembered, of recruits enrolled for 
the purpose, amounted to about 70,000; and the 
fleet was to number about 250 ships. Every- 
thing, however, was to be done in due form. 
Another embassy was sent to Carthage, with 
instructions to put the direct question, whether 
the government accepted the responsibility for 
the destruction of Saguntum. There was, it is 
true, a peace-party in Carthage, but it had been 
reduced to helplessness. The envoys could 
obtain no satisfaction. Their spokesman, one 
of the great Fabian House, on receiving a reply 



180 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

which could have no meaning but war, gathered 
up his robe into a fold and cried, " We bring 
you peace and war ; take which you please." 
He was met with a fierce cry, " Give us which 
you will." Fabius shook out the fold with the 
words, " I give you war," and the answer was, 
" We accept it." 

I shall pass as quickly as possible over the 
early operations of the war. Early in the 
spring of 218 B.C. Hannibal left his winter 
quarters at New Carthage, crossed the Ebro, 
and fought his way from that river to the foot 
of the Pyrenees. The Pyrensean range itself 
presented no great difficulties. At the Rhone 
he encountered formidable opposition, but 
effected a crossing with great skill. In his march 
from the Rhone to the Alps, and in his passage 
of the Alps themselves he suffered little from 
hostile attacks. But the natural difficulties of 
the route were great, and he was late. He 
appears to have left New Carthage at the 
beginning of May. We may be sure that the 
start was made at the earliest practicable 
moment, but the delay was to cost much. 
Could he have moved a month earlier it would 
have been well. As it was he did not reach 
the Alps till the beginning of October, when 
the snows have already begun to fall on the 



THE SONS OF LIGHTNING 181 

higher ranges. The crossing was effected in 
fifteen days, but the cost in men and beasts of 
burden was tremendous. Hannibal had started 
from New Carthage with 90,000 foot and 
16,000 horse ; he descended into the Lombard 
plains with 20,000 infantry and 6,000 horse. 
He had very little more than one-fourth of his 
original numbers. He had not indeed lost the 
other three-fourths by battle or by disease. 
Many had deserted, many had been sent home, 
and the troops that remained were thoroughly 
trustworthy. But the fact remains that an 
army of 26,000 was even ludicrously small to 
be confronted with such an enemy as Rome. 
(It may be noted that the infantry was made 
up of Africans and Spaniards. The higher 
posts in the army were filled by Carthaginians, 
and some probably served in the cavalry, but 
in the main the army consisted of mercenaries.) 

It would be a pity to omit so picturesque 
an incident as Hannibal's dream. Livy 
thus relates it : "He saw — so the story goes 
— a youth of godlike shape, who said that 
he had been sent by Jupiter to conduct the 
army of Hannibal into Italy ; that he was 
therefore to follow, without ever turning away 
his eyes. At first Hannibal followed, trembling, 



182 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

looking neither round him nor behind ; after a 
while, with the curiosity natural to the human 
mind, as he thought what that on which he was 
forbidden to look back might be, he could no 
longer restrain his eyes. What he saw was a 
serpent of portentous size moving onward with 
fearful destruction of bushes and trees ; close 
behind the creature followed a storm-cloud with 
crashing thunder. He asked what this portent 
meant, and was told, 'It means the devastation 
of Italy.' He must go straight on, and leave 
the fates in darkness." 



V 



THE AVALANCHE FROM THE ALPS 

A FEW days for rest and refreshment of the 
army were imperatively needed, but only 
a very few could be spared. Hannibal could not 
hope to face his antagonists without a large 
increase to his army, and this increase he could 
only get for the moment from the Gauls, the 
people in whose country he was, though later 
on reinforcements might be expected from 
Carthage. The Gauls would be ready enough 
to join him, for they were permanently hostile 
to Rome ; but they would have to be satisfied 
of his strength. A war had opportunely broken 
out between the Taurini (Turin) and the 
Insubres (Milan). Hannibal took the part 
of the latter, and stormed a stronghold of 
the Taurini. From that moment he could 

practically command the services of as many 

183 



1 84 



ROME AND CARTHAGE 



Gauls as he wanted. But he had now to meet 
the Romans for the first time in the field. 

P. Cornelius Scipio, one of the Consuls of 
the year, had had the province of Spain allotted 
to him. His intention had been to dispute the 
passage of the Rhone, but Hannibal had moved 
with such rapidity that Scipio found himself 
anticipated. The Carthaginians were already 
across the river when Scipio reached its 
mouth, and had secured so long a start that it 
was useless to follow him. But the news of 
the Carthaginian's arrival in Italy seemed to 
demand instant action. He handed his army 
over to Cnaeus, his brother and second-in- 
command, reserving for himself a few picked 
troops only, and sailed for Italy, where he took 
over the division under the charge of the 
praetor Manlius. He marched as rapidly as 
possible to Placentia (Piacenza), where he 
crossed the Po, and advanced up the left bank 
of the river till he reached the Ticinus ( Ticino), 
one of its tributaries. Over this stream he 
threw a bridge, which he protected by building 
a fort. Hannibal was encamped some ten 
miles to the westward, at a spot called Ictumuli, 
and had sent out Maharbal in command of 
some Numidian cavalry to ravage the country ; 
sparing, however, all the territory belonging to 



THE AVALANCHE FROM THE ALPS 185 

the Gallic tribes. Maharbal was recalled when 
the advance of the Romans became known, 
and Hannibal moved out of his camp, in 
personal command of his cavalry. Scipio did 
exactly the same. The battle that ensued was 
therefore wholly a battle of cavalry. This put 
the Romans at a great disadvantage. They 
were distinctly inferior in this arm, and the 
nature of the country, an expanse of un- 
incumbered plain, gave the enemy every 
opportunity of making the best of the advan- 
tage. Scipio had put some light-armed troops 
in the van. They seemed to have been of the 
poorest quality, for they fled at the first impact 
of the two armies. The regular cavalry of the 
Romans showed to better advantage. They 
held their own for some time against their 
assailants, also a force of regular cavalry. But 
they were at a great disadvantage. The 
fugitives from the front had thrown their lines 
into disorder. These it was impossible to keep 
firm when those panic-stricken creatures were 
trying to find their way through them. Then 
there happened a great misfortune. Scipio was 
so seriously wounded that he had to give up the 
command. According to the most generally 
received account, he was saved from capture 
by the valour of his son, then a lad of eighteen. 



1 86 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

We shall hear of him again, for he became in 
later years the great hero of the war, Scipio 
Africanus the elder. Some of the Roman 
cavalry made a determined stand round their 
wounded chief and contrived to carry him off 
the field. But the battle was lost. The defeat, 
however, was not so complete that the Roman 
camp was in any danger. Hannibal, who was 
still hampered by his scanty numbers, was 
content to rest on the field oi battle. That 
night the Romans hurriedly retreated to 
Placentia, hoping to find their bridge unbroken. 
They had actually reached their destination 
before Hannibal became aware of their depar- 
ture. He was in time enough, however, to 
capture some six hundred stragglers whom 
he found lingering on the left bank of the 
Po. A great raft had been constructed for 
the passage of the river, and they were at 
work in loosing it. Hannibal came upon 
them while they were so employed. He 
captured the men, but the raft, which it would 
have been a great advantage to secure, floated 
down-stream. Two days were spent in look- 
ing for a practicable ford. Before this could 
be found the Roman army had recovered its 
order and confidence. It suffered, however, a 
most damaging blow within the next few days. 



THE AVALANCHE FROM THE ALPS 187 

A body of Gallic auxiliaries, two thousand 
infantry, and two hundred cavalry, deserted to 
Hannibal, cutting down the sentries at the 
camp gate. The Carthaginian general gave 
them a hearty welcome, and held out to them 
great promises of advancement and reward. 
For the present he sent them to their homes. 
The best service, in his judgment, that they 
could do was to spread abroad the report of his 
generosity and of the Roman defeat. 

Scipio now moved southward, falling back to 
a position near the river Trebia, a tributary of 
the Po, which flows into it on its right or 
southern bank. Here he fortified a camp, and 
sat down to await the arrival of Sempronius, 
his colleague in the Consulship, who had been 
recalled from his province (Sicily) to take part in 
the defence of Italy. He was suffering greatly 
from his wound, and was unequal to the active 
duties of command, which, however, he was un- 
willing to hand over to a substitute. Probably 
it would have been unconstitutional to do so, 
when the other Consul was within reach. Yet 
the praetor Manlius, in whose charge the army 
had originally been, was probably in the camp. 
Constitutional forms, as we shall see again and 
again, weakened the military energies of Rome. 
Nothing could be imagined more absurd than 



1 88 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

that the army should have been entrusted to 
generals, changed every year, and elected by 
popular vote. To oppose such men to the 
unequalled genius of Hannibal was to ensure 
defeat. The mere permanence of the Cartha- 
ginian command gave him an immense 
advantage. But we must never forget the 
other side of the case. Without these constitu- 
tional forms neither Rome nor Greece (about 
which the historian has to say much the same 
thing) could have been what they were. We 
must expect to find in a nation as in a man the 
defects of its great qualities. 

Sempronius joined his colleague some time, 
it would seem, during the month of November. 
He was all for action. "It is intolerable," 
he urged, " that Italy should be invaded and 
Rome threatened in this fashion. And what 
are we waiting for ? There is no third army 
that can join us. Our men will lose all heart if 
we let them sit in their camp while the enemy 
plunders our friends." All this is natural 
enough, especially when we know that the 
Romans had very little idea, so far, of what 
Hannibal really was. But Livy, doubtless, is 
right when he adds that Sempronius had before 
his eyes the approaching election of Consuls. 
On the i st of January ensuing he would have 



THE AVALANCHE FROM THE ALPS 189 

to go out of office, and yield up his command. 
If he was to gain the distinction of a victory he 
must strike at once. 

He was encouraged by success in an affair in 
which he had engaged against the more prudent 
counsels of his colleague. He had strongly 
urged the duty of defending the friendly Gauls, 
had overruled the opposition of Scipio, and had 
actually carried off the honours of victory in a 
considerable cavalry skirmish. 

Hannibal's plan was sufficiently simple. He 
was well aware — for what we should now call his 
"intelligence department" seems to have been 
admirably managed l — of Sempronius's eager- 
ness for battle. In the country that lay between 
the two camps was a spot which seemed admir- 
ably suited for an ambush ; the bed of a stream, 
closed in on either side by steep banks, and 
enclosing a considerable space of level ground, 
thickly covered with bush. Here he put his 
brother Mago with a picked force of 2,000 
men, composed of equal numbers of cavalry and 
infantry. " You have an enemy," he said in 
dismissing them, "who is blind to these 
stratagems of war." How familiar the words 
have been made by recent experiences of our 

1 The Gallic auxiliaries in the Roman camp were his 
chief sources of information. 



190 



ROME AND CARTHAGE 



own ! These arrangements made, Hannibal 
sent his Numidian cavalry at dawn the next 
day with instructions to ride up to the Roman 
camp, to pour a shower of missiles upon the 
sentries, and, if possible, to provoke an engage- 
ment. Sempronius was, he knew, eager to 
fight. This insulting demonstration would stir 
the temper of the men in such a way that they 
would obey with enthusiasm a command to 
advance. The device was completely successful. 
Sempronius led forth his men in hot haste after 
the Numidians, who retreated in apparent dis- 
order. The Romans, thus hurriedly summoned, 
had not had a meal ; their horses had not been 
fed ; and they suffered from cold as well as 
from hunger. It was a snowy day in November, 
and the region, the marshy, low-lying ground 
between the Alps and the Apennines, had an 
inclement climate. More than this, they had to 
cross the river, whose waters, swollen by the 
autumn rains, and now breast high, struck a 
piercing cold into their limbs. When they 
emerged on the other side of the stream they 
could scarcely grasp their weapons. 

Hannibal's men were in very different case 
when they were led forth to encounter the enemy, 
warmed by fires in their tents, and strengthened 
by a leisurely meal. The order of battle was 



THE AVALANCHE FROM THE ALPS 191 

this. The slingers were in front ; on either 
wing the cavalry and the elephants ; in the 
centre the heavy-armed infantry. The total 
number is given by Polybius at about forty 
thousand. Half of these were infantry, 
Spaniards, Africans, and Gauls, these last 
representing the addition which Hannibal had 
been able to make to the army of the Alps. 
The cavalry numbered more than ten thousand, 
Here also Gauls appear as " Celtic allies." Of 
the slingers there were eight thousand. The 
Roman force was almost exactly equal, but 
differently made up. It had but four thousand 
cavalry, as against ten thousand. Of the 
infantry, sixteen thousand were Romans, and 
twenty thousand auxiliaries. 

It was among the light-armed and the cavalry 
that the first signs of disorder and weakness 
could be seen. They were specially depressed 
by suffering and exhaustion. A light-armed 
soldier is nothing if he has lost his mobility, 
and this is exactly what had happened to the 
Romans. They could render little or no help 
to the heavy-armed, whose flanks and front 
were alike exposed, without any kind of cover- 
ing, to hostile attack. The centre, nevertheless, 
offered a stout resistance to the enemy. For a 
time they held their ground manfully, and in 



192 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

one direction did more than hold it. A body of 
ten thousand men broke through the Cartha- 
ginian line, and steadily made their way to 
Placentia, where, of course, they were in safety. 
Of the rest of the army few survived. Their 
line was first broken by the unexpected charge 
of the ambushed force. This was actually in 
the rear of the Roman infantry, and the attack 
which they made from behind on the legions, 
occupied as they were with what was going on 
in front, was very destructive. 

Many, also, were crushed by the elephants, 
which gave valuable help to their side, not, 
however, without some counterbalancing mis- 
chief. The animals, once wounded, became un- 
manageable, and were quite as likely to damage 
their friends as their foes. This was, indeed, 
the last as well as the first occasion on which 
Hannibal used them, for the cold was so severe 
that all but one perished. We may sum up 
what is recorded of the effectiveness of the 
elephant in ancient warfare by saying that his 
first appearance was terrifying, that experience 
greatly lessened the fear with which he was 
regarded, as the means of dealing with him 
were soon learnt, and that he was always an 
incalculable and unreliable force. 

The season was now far advanced, consider- 






THE AVALANCHE FROM THE ALPS 193 

ably beyond the time when it was usual to 
suspend military operations for the year. 
Hannibal retired into winter quarters, though 
his cavalry never ceased to scour and ravage 
the country. At Rome there was much alarm, 
shown, however, in a resolute attempt to do all 
that was possible in the way of preparation for 
the future. 



H 



VI 



THE DISASTER AT THE LAKE 

THE winter of 218-217 Hannibal spent in 
Cisalpine Gaul. Livy tells us that his 
position here was uneasy, that the Gauls were 
dissatisfied with the state of affairs, that they 
had expected the plunder of Italy, but found 
themselves burdened by the presence of a 
powerful guest, and that, in consequence, more 
than one plot was laid for the assassination of 
Hannibal. Whatever truth there may be in 
this story, it is certain that the Carthaginian 
general made good use of his time by recruiting 
among the Gauls. As many as sixty thousand 
foot soldiers and four thousand horsemen are 
said to have joined his standard. Early in the 
spring of 217 he crossed the Apennines. The 
passage of this mountain range was made with- 
out difficulty ; it was when he reached the low- 
lying country between the Arno and the Serchio 

194 



THE DISASTER AT THE LAKE 195 

that his troubles began. His troops were 
decimated by sickness ; multitudes of the 
baggage and cavalry horses perished ; he was 
himself attacked by ophthalmia in so severe a 
form that he lost the sight of one eye. When 
he had extricated himself and his army from 
the marshes, he marched on, plundering and 
wasting the country as he went. 

Of the two Consular armies one was at 
Ariminum (Rimini), nominally watching an 
enemy who was now busy elsewhere, the other 
was at Arretium (Arezzo). It was the latter 
that Hannibal designed to engage, his plans 
being laid in such a way as to show that his 
political sagacity was not less remarkable than 
his military genius. The Roman general was 
C. Flaminius, a vehement advocate of plebeian 
rights. He had denounced the incapacity of the 
Senate and of the patrician generals. He had 
gained some distinction as a soldier, though, 
as a matter of fact, his victories had been won 
by the valour of his troops, which had triumphed 
in spite of their general's blunders. During his 
canvass for the Consulship he had loudly pro- 
claimed that, put at the head of the army, he 
would speedily make an end of the invader. 
Now the time was come for him to make good 



196 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

his boast. If he had been himself disposed to 
hang back, though there is no reason for 
supposing that he doubted of the result, he 
could not disappoint his friends and followers. 
The camp was half filled, we are told, with 
adventurers who had thronged to get a share in 
the Carthaginian plunder. Hannibal marched 
slowly past the Romans, ravaging the country 
as he went, and Flaminius, infuriated by the 
sight, immediately broke up his camp and 
pursued him. The omens were, it was said, of 
the gloomiest kind. When the Consul mounted 
his horse the animal stumbled and threw him ; 
when the standard was to be removed all the 
efforts of the officer whose business it was to 
take charge of it was unable to stir it from the 
ground. Flaminius was wholly unmoved by 
these occurrences, and followed Hannibal in 
hot haste. The Carthaginian laid a trap for 
his antagonist, into which the Roman fell with 
an almost ridiculous simplicity. The road 
southward led past Lake Trasumennus. Here 
it was narrow, the mountains approaching near 
to the water-side ; a little further on there was 
an open space of some extent ; after this again 
the mountains closed in again and made a 
narrow defile. These features are not visible 
to any one who approaches the place from the 






THE DISASTER AT THE LAKE 197 

north ; and the Consul seems to have taken no 
pains to acquaint himself with the road which 
he was following. Hannibal barred the southern 
outlet with a strong force of his picked troops ; 
his cavalry he put in ambush at the point of 
entrance ; the high ground that bordered the 
road on the landward side he occupied with his 
slingers and light-armed troops. Flaminius 
reached the lake at sunset on the day of his 
breaking up his camp at Arretium, and bivou- 
acked there for the night. Next day, at early 
dawn, he moved forward, again without recon- 
noitring, and reached the open space described 
before. A heavy morning mist hung over the 
country, and the Romans saw nothing but the 
road on which they were marching. Their first 
sight of the enemy was when they reached the 
defile where Hannibal himself was in position. 
Almost at the same moment the mist rolled 
away, and they saw that the mountain-sides on 
either hand were alive with enemies, and that 
their retreat was barred by the Carthaginian 
cavalry. At the same moment they found 
themselves attacked, before, says the historian, 
they could form their lines, or even draw their 
swords. 

The result of this surprise was something 
like a panic. The march had been conducted 



198 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

with so much carelessness and disorder that 
the legions and even the maniples or companies 
were broken up. It was by the merest chance 
that a soldier found himself in his proper place, 
or ranged with his proper comrades. Some, it 
would seem, were actually without arms, for 
these were being carried in waggons, and the 
waggons could not be found when they were 
wanted. The mist, it must be remembered, 
though it had cleared away from the higher 
ground, still lay thick upon the lower ground, 
which was indeed very little raised above the 
level of the lake. So it came to pass that, as 
Livy puts it, the ear was of more service than 
the eye. The men rushed where they heard the 
groans of the wounded, the clash of sword upon 
armour, the cry of victory or defeat. The 
coward, flying in terror, found himself entangled 
in the mass of combatants ; the brave man, 
eager to take his part in the struggle, might be 
irresistibly carried off by a crowd of fugitives. 

After a while something of the habitual 
Roman courage reasserted itself. Every one 
could see for himself that the army was 
hemmed in. The mountains were on one 
side, the lake on the other ; at either end of 
the road the passage was barred by serried 
lines of the enemy. If there was to be any 






THE DISASTER AT THE LAKE 199 

deliverance it must come from their own 
strength and valour. Panic was succeeded by 
the courage of despair. Nothing could restore 
to the army its lost order, but it was at least 
determined to sell its existence dearly. And 
here, at least, Flaminius did his duty to the 
utmost. Incompetent as he was as a general, 
he was the bravest of the brave. "It is not 
by prayers to heaven," he cried, " that you will 
escape. Strength and courage, and these 
alone, will save you. The less your fear, the 
smaller the danger." The men answered to 
their leader's call. So fierce was the fight that 
the combatants were wholly unconscious of an 
earthquake which, at the very hour when the 
battle raged most fiercely, laid more than one 
city in ruins, changed the courses of river, and 
brought down huge masses of earth and rock 
from the mountains to the plains. 

It was round the person of the Consul that 
the battle raged most fiercely. He was a con- 
spicuous figure in the scarlet cloak which 
marked the officer in chief command, and in 
arms of unusual splendour. And as long as he 
was in the front the legions held their own. 
For three hours the issue seemed to be in 
suspense. But a general who exposes himself 
as recklessly as the Consul felt constrained to 



200 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

do can hardly hope to escape. And there 
were some in the hostile ranks who bore him a 
special grudge. Five years before Flaminius 
had carried on a campaign against the Insu- 
brian Gauls, 1 and had treated them, it would 
seem, with exceptional severity. An Insubrian 
trooper now recognised him. " This is the 
man," he cried to his comrades, "who 
slaughtered our countrymen, and laid waste 
our fields. I will offer him a sacrifice to the 
spirits of the dead." So saying, he set spurs 
to his horse and charged through the Roman 
line. The Consul's armour-bearer threw him- 
self in the way, and was struck down. The 
Consul himself fell mortally wounded. A 
fierce struggle took place over his body, but 
the Roman veterans succeeded in rescuing it. 
But to an army that is fighting at a disadvan- 
tage the fall of its leader is often a disabling 
blow. So it was at Lake Trasumennus. The 
Roman army no longer held its ground. 
Frantic attempts were made to fly. Some 
tried to climb the mountain-side ; others 
endeavoured to escape by wading out into 
the lake. Very few succeeded in either 
attempt. In the lake, especially, many 
perished. Those who attempted to swim 
1 Near Mediolanum (Milan). 



THE DISASTER AT THE LAKE 201 

were drowned sooner or later ; those who 
made their way back to the shore were cut 
down by the enemy's horsemen, who rode out 
in the shallow and were ready to receive them. 
Fifteen thousand in all were slain ; ten thousand 
contrived to escape. One body of six thousand, 
possibly a complete legion, succeeded in forcing 
its way through the defile occupied by Hanni- 
bal's troops. But its fate was only delayed for 
a time. It was without provisions, and without 
guides. When, the next day, Maharbal with the 
Carthaginian cavalry appeared, it surrendered. 
Hannibal's loss was fifteen hundred slain and a 
very considerable number of wounded. Livy 
gives these figures on the authority of a con- 
temporary writer, Fabius Pictor. 



VII 



THE OVERTHROW AT CANN.E 

THE disastrous defeat at Lake Trasu- 
mennus was followed by a change of 
policy at Rome. Quintus Fabius, who was ap- 
pointed dictator, was as cautious as Flaminius 
had been rash. His plan was to watch the 
enemy, to use all the opportunities which a 
knowledge of the country and the friendly feeling 
of the population — for Italy remained firmly 
faithful to Rome — put in his way. To a certain 
extent he was successful. While he was in com- 
mand Rome suffered no disasters. But he was, 
probably, nothing more than an able soldier. 
He had nothing like the genius of Hannibal, 
and when he might have struck a really effec- 
tive blow at the enemy, he allowed himself to 
be outwitted. And the Romans had not yet 
thoroughly learnt their lesson. They wearied 
of the cautious strategy of Fabius which 
avoided defeat but did not save Italy from 






THE OVERTHROW AT CANNJE 203 

fire and sword. The first result of this revul- 
sion of feeling was putting the dictator's 
second-in-command — " Master of the Horse 
was his official title — on an equality with him. 
Minucius — for this was his name — was an 
adventurous soldier of the Flaminius type. 
He had won some slight successes when 
Fabius had been absent on official business 
in Rome, and he now hoped to distinguish 
himself still more. He took charge of half 
the army, and pitched a camp for himself. It 
was not long, however, before he was out- 
manoeuvred by the enemy, and reduced to 
extremities, from which he was saved by the 
timely arrival of Fabius. But different views 
of these events prevailed at Rome — and we 
must remember that we have one side only of 
the case. It was affirmed that Minucius had 
been purposely deserted, and that his reverse 
was due to the intrigues of the aristocrats. 
Great popular excitement followed, and the 
result was that when the Consuls of the new 
year were elected a violent partisan, Terentius 
Varro by name, was put in office. Varro, 
though he could scarcely have been as incom- 
petent as we should suppose from Livy's 
account, 1 had had no military experience. The 
1 He held important commands in subsequent years. 



204 



ROME AND CARTHAGE 



aristocrats succeeded in giving him as a 
colleague L. v'Emilius Paullus, a soldier of 
some reputation, but unfortunately much dis- 
liked by the commons. 

Hannibal was now in Apulia, in Southern 
Italy, where he probably found the population 
more sympathetic than in the north, the 
larger Greek element being not yet recon- 
ciled to Roman rule. His headquarters were 
at Cannae, a town on the right or southern 
bank of the Aufidus. The Roman army, 
which was under peremptory instructions from 
home to fight, had probably followed the Via 
Appia as far as Venusia, and had then marched 
eastward. A garrison was probably left at 
Canusium, a strongly fortified town, about six 
miles to the west of Cannae. An hour's march 
from Canusium must have brought them within 
sight of Hannibal. He was encamped outside 
Cannae, the country round him being level and 
so well adapted for the operations of cavalry, an 
arm in which he was particularly strong. A 
difference of opinion now developed itself 
between the two Consuls. vEmilius Paullus 
was for drawing the enemy into a country less 
suited to him ; Varro, on the other hand, was 
impatient to fight at once. He ordered an 
advance, which resulted in a partial engage- 



THE OVERTHROW AT CANNM 205 

ment, terminating, on the whole, not unfavour- 
ably to the Romans. 

The final position taken up by the Consuls 
was this. Two-thirds of the army was located 
on the north or left bank of the river, the 
remainder was left on the south, being very 
nearly in touch with the Carthaginian outposts. 
It must be remembered that the Aufidus, a 
shallow and rapid stream, dwindled in summer 
to a very inconsiderable river which might be 
forded anywhere without difficulty, at least in 
this part of its course. The battle was fought 
on August 2nd, according to the Roman 
calendar, but as this was very much in advance 
of the true time, really in the middle of June, 
Paullus was for a policy of inactivity. He 
believed that Hannibal would have to shift his 
ground for want of supplies, and he hoped that 
he might find a favourable opportunity for 
delivering an attack. His colleague, however, 
had a very different view of the situation. 
Naturally rash and eager, he was irritated by 
the aggressive movements of the enemy, who 
did all that was possible to provoke him. The 
Roman troops, too, were eager to fight, and 
they soon had their wish. 

It was the custom that when the two Consuls 
were with the army they should exercise the 



206 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

command on alternate days. At early dawn on 
his day of command Varro gave orders to the 
force encamped on the north bank of the 
Aufidus to cross the stream. This done he 
drew out his whole force in a long line fronting 
the south. He had in all about 80,000 infantry 
and 6,000 horse. The Roman cavalry he 
posted on the right wing along the river bank ; 
the right centre consisted of the Roman foot, 
which was drawn up in deeper and closer for- 
mation than usual ; the left centre and the left 
wing were made up of the horse and foot of the 
allies. The archers and light-armed generally 
were in advance of the main line. Hannibal 
posted his Gallic and Spanish cavalry on his 
left wing, i.e., opposite the Roman horse, and 
his African horse on the right. Next the 
mounted troops on either side was a body of 
African infantry, equipped with armour and 
weapons collected from the spoils of Trebia and 
Trasumennus. The centre consisted of Gauls 
and Spaniards. Livy speaks of the imposing 
effect of their stature, for physically these Celtic 
warriors were greatly superior to their Italian 
antagonists, and of their general appearance. 
The Gauls were naked to the waist, the 
Spaniards clad in linen vests, of dazzling 
whiteness, edged with purple. In numbers 



THE OVERTHROW AT CANNM 207 

Hannibal was greatly inferior, having only 
40,000 infantry. For this disadvantage he 
was partly compensated by the superiority of 
his cavalry, both in numbers and efficiency. 
Of this arm he had no less than 10,000. Livy 
tells us, though Polybius does not mention the 
circumstance, that a strong wind from the S.E., 
locally known as the Volturnus, carrying with 
it clouds of sand, blew into the faces of the 
Romans, and greatly incommoded them. 

The battle began, as usual, with some inde- 
cisive skirmishing between the light-armed 
troops on either side. The Gallic and Spanish 
cavalry, on the contrary, soon achieved a very 
decided success. There was little room for the 
display of tactics or even for a charge. The 
combatants came to close quarters, and here 
the great personal strength of the Celts gave 
them an advantage. They dismounted and 
dragged their antagonists from their horses. 
A valiant resistance was made ; it was not till 
many had been slain in this fierce struggle that 
any sought safety in flight. 

The legionary infantry did not fail to assert 
its superiority in discipline and effective equip- 
ment over the Gallic and Spanish foot opposed 
to it. The latter fought with conspicuous 
courage, but failed to bear up against the 



208 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

weight and the orderly advance of the heavy- 
armed Romans. Had there been a cool- 
headed soldier in command at this point the 
success of the legions might have been turned 
to excellent advantage. Wanting capable 
leadership it ended in disaster. The pursuit 
was carried far beyond the point at which, in 
view of the fact that the cavalry had been 
driven off the field, prudence would have 
stopped it. The legions, while they followed 
the flying Celts, were themselves assailed on 
either flank by the African contingents, made 
on this occasion more formidable by the fact 
that they had a Roman equipment of armour 
and weapons. Already disordered by their 
hasty advance, they were still further broken 
by this attack. But though the line ceased to 
exist, many of the companies preserved their 
formation, and, for a time, the conflict was 
carried on under fairly equal conditions. A 
brilliant charge by the Carthaginian cavalry 
under Hasdrubal l decided the day. He had 
led his Celtic host in the fierce conflict with the 
Romans, had afterwards helped the Numidians 
to beat the allies, and he now threw himself 

1 Not to be identified with any other officer of the same 
name, for, strangely enough, he is not mentioned on any 
other occasion. 



THE OVERTHROW AT CANNM 209 

with his victorious squadrons on the rear of the 
Roman legions. After this there was but little 
more resistance offered, and the battle became 
a massacre. Rome never suffered a more 
frightful loss than she did on the fatal day of 
Cannae. Of the 80,000 men whom she brought 
into the field only three or four thousand 
escaped. The number of the slain is put by 
Polybius at 70,000 ; Livy gives a much smaller 
figure (40,000), but Polybius is the most trust- 
worthy authority. Many prisoners were taken, 
some in the camps which they had been left to 
guard, some at Cannae, where they vainly 
sought refuge. Only those who had the 
wisdom or good fortune to make their way to 
Canusium found themselves in safety. Varro, 
with some seventy troopers, escaped to Venusia. 
/Emilius Paullus died upon the field. Livy tells 
a pathetic story of his end, which may well be 
true, though Polybius does not mention it. 1 It 
runs thus : — 

One Lentulus, a military tribune, found the 
Consul sitting on a stone, covered with blood. 

x .His silence is certainly remarkable because he was 
certainly acquainted with Paullus' son, and was on terms of 
intimate friendship with his grandson. (The younger 
Scipio was a son of the iEmilius Paullus who conquered 
Macedonia, and was adopted by a son of the elder Scipio.) 

15 



2io ROME AND CARTHAGE 

He offered him his horse. They might both 
escape. He was himself un wounded and 
could help his chief. " Do not add," he went 
on, " to the other disasters of the day the 
death of a Consul. There will be tears and 
mourning enough without that." Paullus re- 
fused the offer. " Do not waste," he said, " in 
useless pity your own opportunity of escape. 
Go and tell the Senate from me to make Rome 
as strong as possible against the arrival of the 
victorious enemy. As to me, let me die here 
in the midst of my slaughtered soldiers. I do 
not wish again to be brought to trial or to 
prove my own innocence by accusing my 
colleague." Here a crowd of fugitives, fol- 
lowed close by the enemy, swept over them. 
Lentulus escaped, thanks to the swiftness of 
his horse. The Consul, whom the pursuers 
did not recognise, was slain. 

Paullus, it will have been seen, is represented 
as anticipating the immediate advance of 
Hannibal against Rome. The question whether 
that advance should have been made has, we 
might say, been discussed ever since ; Livy 
tells us that Hannibal was strongly urged by 
his own lieutenants to take this step. Maharbal, 
who was one of the ablest among them, 
declared that if he would but start at once he 




o 



THE OVERTHROW AT CANNAE 211 

should be feasting in the Capitol in four days' 
time ; and when Hannibal refused to follow 
his advice, added, " I see that the gods do not 
give all things to one man. You know how to 
win a victory, but you do not know how to use 
it." 

It is impossible, of course, to speak with 
confidence on such a subject. That Hannibal 
was thoroughly competent to judge of the 
situation from a soldier's point of view must be 
conceded. Nor is it difficult to see that, 
victorious as he had been, his available force 
must have been greatly reduced. His loss in 
killed is said to have been 6,000. The pro- 
portion of wounded in ancient warfare was far 
smaller than that which prevails under modern 
conditions. Still we must make a considerable 
addition if we would reckon the total of the 
disabled. He had about 55,000 on the 
morning of the battle, and could hardly have 
been able to put more than 30,000 in the 
fighting line at its close. He thought it better, 
under the circumstances, to wait for the results 
of his victory on those who both within and 
without Italy were watching the course of the 
war. These were not inconsiderable, but they 
were not as decisive as might have been 
expected. And Hannibal seems to have con- 



212 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

tinued to hope for developments which never 
occurred. Perhaps we may say that it would 
have been wise to have abandoned the Italian 
campaign, if, six months after Cannae, he still 
felt himself unable to march on Rome. This is 
one of the questions upon which the most saga- 
cious of men and the ablest of generals may be 
mistaken. To abandon Italy would have been 
to give up the dream of his life, and to this 
Hannibal could not bring himself, even after it 
must have become evident to his cooler judg- 
ment that Rome was not to be vanquished. 



VIII 



THE SECRET MARCH 



THE result of the victory of Cannae, stated 
broadly, was that the southern half of 
Italy threw in its lot with Hannibal. The 
Samnites, in former days the fiercest and most 
dangerous enemies of Rome ; the Campanians, 
a warlike race whose name has occurred more 
than once in my story, and who possessed in 
Capua the second city of Italy ; the Greek 
region, far less populous and wealthy than it 
had once been, but still formidable, and the 
aboriginal mountain tribes of Bruttium declared 
against Rome. Northern Italy, however, 
remained faithful, and even the disaffected 
territories were more or less held in check by 
the colonies, Latin as well as Roman, for the 
Latins were firm in their allegiance. 1 On the 

1 A colony, I may remind my readers, was practically a 

military outpost. It was inhabited by old soldiers to whom 

213 



214 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

whole the effect of the disaster was not so 
absolutely crushing as might have been 
expected. Hannibal's most noteworthy gain 
during the remainder of the year was the 
accession of Capua. Rome had the profound 
relief of feeling that the worst was over, and 
that she still existed. This relief was expressed 
in a truly characteristic way when the Senate 
voted thanks to Varro "because he had not 
despaired of the Republic." To Varro, indeed, 
no thanks were due ; he had done nothing 
more than save his own life ; what the reso- 
lution really expressed was that Rome had 
survived what might well have been an 
annihilating blow. 

land had been granted. There were two classes of colonies, 
Roman and Latin, as there were two kinds of citizenship, 
Roman and Latin. Livy has an interesting passage about 
the behaviour of the Latin colonies in the year 209. 
There were thirty in all. Twelve of these declared them- 
selves to be unable to comply with the requisitions for men 
and money made upon them. The other eighteen ex- 
pressed themselves in an opposite sense, as willing to do 
even more than was asked of them. Among these we find 
Brundisium, Luceria, Venusium, Paestum, and Beneventum, 
all important places in the region generally occupied by 
Hannibal. Livy goes so far as to say that it was their 
support that was the salvation of Rome. " After all these 
years they must not be forgotten or deprived of the praise 
which they so well deserved." 



THE SECRET MARCH 215 

The next two years (215-214) passed with- 
out any event of great importance. One 
serious danger, indeed, threatened Rome, but 
it passed away. At Syracuse, Hiero, who had 
been a steady friend for nearly fifty years, had 
been succeeded by his grandson, Hieronymus, 
a foolish lad, who was under Carthaginian 
influence. In Macedonia Philip V. made up 
his mind to give active help to Hannibal. 
But Hieronymus was assassinated before he 
could do anything, and Philip, for reasons 
which we do not know, let the opportunity 
pass. In 213 Tarentum fell into the hands 
of Hannibal, though the citadel was held by 
a Roman garrison. In 212 the Carthaginians 
won a great victory at Herdonia in Apulia, 
wholly destroying a Roman army, and got 
possession of some important towns in Southern 
Italy. They had also a great success in Spain, 
where two Roman armies were defeated with 
the loss of their commanders, Cnseus and 
Publius Scipio. On the other hand, Rome 
recovered Syracuse, which was taken by 
Marcellus after a siege of nearly two years' 
duration. Hard pressed as she was in other 
directions she thus accomplished what Athens 
and Carthage, both at the height of their 
power, had failed to do. And Capua was 



216 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

invested ; nor could Hannibal, victorious as 
he was in the field, relieve it. Much, it is 
evident, turned on the fate of Capua. No 
Italian city would venture to take up the 
Carthaginian cause if this important place 
could not be protected. In 210, accordingly, 
Hannibal made a vigorous effort to relieve it. 
In the hope of compelling the Consuls to raise 
the siege, he threatened Rome itself, and 
advanced to within ' three miles of the city. 
He even rode up with a body of cavalry to 
the walls. But he failed to achieve his pur- 
pose. One of the Consuls led his army from 
before Capua to the relief of the capital, but 
the other still pressed the siege. Hannibal 
retreated, and though he turned upon the 
Consul, who was following him somewhat 
carelessly, and defeated him with very heavy 
loss, he could not relieve Capua. This city 
capitulated before the end of the year. In 
209 Hannibal won another great battle on 
the same spot, Herdonia, where he had 
triumphed two years before. In the field, 
it will be seen, he was always successful, but 
he could not be everywhere, nor could he 
protect all his Italian allies. In this year 
the two important regions of Samnium and 
Lucania gave in their submission to Rome, 



THE SECRET MARCH 217 

which had the wisdom to grant them favour- 
able terms. And Tarentum was lost, betrayed 
to the Romans, as it had been betrayed a 
few years before to Hannibal. The next year 
(208) was marked by the death of the consul 
Marcellus, and by other Carthaginian successes. 
In 207 we came to another great crisis of the 
war, the attempt of Hasdrubal to join his 
brother, ending in the decisive battle of the 
Metaurus. 

We last heard of Hasdrubal as defeating 
the two Scipios in 212. What hindered him 
from following up this success by an immediate 
march into Italy it is impossible to say. 
Livy's account of the transactions of the next 
five years is wholly incredible, and Polybius' 
narrative is lost. It is rash to pronounce a 
judgment where we know so little of the 
facts. Still it is generally true that few 
commanders have the same power of per- 
spective which Hannibal seems to have 
possessed. It is at least possible that Has- 
drubal may have overrated the importance of 
what he might be able to do in Spain, and 
have forgotten that the war had really to be 
decided in Italy. It is a fact that he put 
off his advance in Italy for four years, and 
that when he made it his general prospects 



2lS 



ROME AND CARTHAGE 



had not improved. A very able young com- 
mander, afterwards known as Scipio Africanus, 
had appeared upon the scene, and had achieved 
the great success of capturing New Carthage. 
This he followed up in 209 by defeating 
Hasdrubal himself. This defeat, however, did 
not prevent the Carthaginian general from 
carrying out his original plan. Either in this 
year or in the next he crossed the Pyrenees. 
He spent a considerable time in Gaul, where 
he was able to enlist a large number of 
recruits, and, after an easy passage of the 
Alps, descended into Italy early in the year 
207. And here, again, we find him neglecting, 
as far as we can see, the main issue, and 
wasting strength and time on a quite sub- 
ordinate matter. He besieged Placentia, a 
strongly fortified colony, and so gave the 
Romans time to recover from the surprise of 
his unexpectedly early arrival. By the time 
he had made up his mind to raise the siege 
of Placentia, one of the Consuls, Livius by 
name, had advanced to bar his way. 

The Roman generals must have been aware 
that the main object of Hasdrubal's descent 
into Italy was to effect a junction with his 
brother. And now, by a lucky chance, they 
found out how this was to be done. Has- 



THE SECRET MARCH 219 

drubal sent a party of six horsemen charged 
with a letter to his brother, in which he 
announced his arrival in Italy, and suggested 
that they should meet in Umbria. These 
messengers traversed nearly the whole of Italy 
in safety, only to fail at the last. When they were 
some thirty or forty miles from Metapontum, 
where Hannibal was encamped, they took the 
wrong road, and made for Tarentum. They 
fell into the hands of a foraging party, and 
were brought before the officer who was in 
local command. To him they confessed, under 
threats of torture, that they carried despatches 
to Hannibal. The officer sent them on to 
the Consul Nero, who was watching Hannibal. 
Nero at once conceived a bold design. The 
junction of the two Carthaginian armies must 
be prevented at any cost, and the best means 
of doing this would be to strengthen the 
army of the north, and crush Hasdrubal 
before he could unite his forces with his 
brother's. But there was no time to be lost. 
Nero picked seven thousand men out of his 
army, the very best troops that he had, and 
hurried northwards. No one knew of his 
plan ; even the authorities at Rome were hood- 
winked. Nor did he hamper himself with 
transport. He would be passing through a 



220 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

friendly population, and he judged it sufficient 
to send messengers before him with directions 
that ready-cooked provisions should be brought 
down for the use of the army, with such horses 
as would suffice to carry what was absolutely 
necessary. Everything turned out well. The 
soldiers made forced marches of extraordinary 
length, and reached their journey's end without 
mishap, entering the camp at night, as it was 
desirable to keep their coming a secret. This, 
however, was not effectually done. Hasdrubal 
had at least some suspicion of what had 
happened. Riding up to the Roman camp, he 
observed some shields of unfamiliar pattern. 
Some of the horses were leaner than those he 
had seen before, and there were, as he thought, 
more of them. Another suspicious circumstance 
was one for which he had been on the look- 
out. There were, it should be explained, two 
Roman camps, one in charge of the Consul 
Livius, the other commanded by the praetor 
Porcius. In the Consul's camp the signal was 
sounded twice, indicating that both consuls 
were there. On the other hand there was the 
perplexing circumstance that the limits of the 
camps had not been extended. If a large 
reinforcement had arrived, where could they 
have been put away ? Above all, was it 



THE SECRET MARCH 221 

possible that a general so consummately skilful 
as Hannibal had allowed such a manoeuvre 
to be made ? Or was it possible that Hannibal 
had been destroyed ? The general result of 
these questionings was great discouragement. 
He declined the battle which the Consuls, who 
had made up their minds to fight without delay, 
offered him as soon as possible after Nero's 
arrival, and in the course of the following 
night struck his camp and moved away. It 
is not easy to say what was his object in thus 
retreating, for a northward movement was a 
retreat, the Metaurus river, which he wished 
to cross, being some miles to the north of his 
camp. Possibly he wished to get to a region 
where the population would be friendly. Any- 
how, the movement ended in disaster. Two 
guides whom he had pressed into his service 
contrived to disappear in the night-march, and 
the ford of the Metaurus could not be dis- 
covered. The army proceeded slowly up the 
right bank of the river. It was a fatiguing 
march ; many men fell out, and all were wearied 
and dispirited. Early in the next day the 
Roman army came up, and Hasdrubal saw 
that he must fight. He posted his elephants 
as usual in front of the centre, with the 
Ligurians behind them. On the right were 



222 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

his Spanish troops, veteran soldiers of his 
own, and of the very best quality. These 
were under his personal command. The Gauls 
were on the left, but seem to have taken but 
little part in the battle that followed. The 
Spaniards acquitted themselves in a way 
worthy of their military reputation, and main- 
tained the struggle for some time on equal 
terms. The result of the day was in a great 
measure decided by a bold movement of Nero. 
He judged that he might safely neglect the 
Gauls, who were his special antagonists, and 
wheeling rapidly from the left, fell upon the 
enemy with crushing effect. The elephants 
behaved as usual. Formidable at first, they 
threw the lines of the enemy into disorder ; 
then becoming unmanageable did not less 
damage to their friends. Livy says that more 
were killed by their drivers than by the enemy. 
The battle was long and fierce. So much is 
amply testified by the amount of the Roman 
loss. No less than eight thousand men were 
slain, a very large proportion, it is certain, of 
the number engaged. The Carthaginian army, 
of course, suffered more. Probably few of the 
Spanish troops survived. Some of the Ligurians 
escaped, and many of the Gauls. They were 
not far from their own country, and the Romans 



THE SECRET MARCH 223 

were probably too much exhausted to make an 
energetic pursuit. " Let some be left alive," 
said the Consul Livius, when he was urged to 
follow the Gauls, " to carry home accounts of 
the enemy's losses, and of our valour." These 
could hardly have been his real reasons. But 
the total loss in killed and prisoners is put at 
sixty thousand. Hasdrubal fell in the battle. 
As long as there was any hope of victory he 
had done his best, reforming the line again 
and again, encouraging the wearied, and 
putting fresh spirit into the discouraged. 
When all was lost, he set spurs to his horse 
and charged the enemy's line. Seven days 
afterwards his head was thrown among the 
advanced guards of Hannibal's camp. 



IX 



HANNIBAL S LAST BATTLE 

WHAT Hannibal proposed to himself by 
remaining in Italy after the disastrously 
decisive day of the Metaurus it is not easy to 
say. Perhaps he continued to hope against 
hope that the great anti- Roman combination, 
for which he had been working for more than 
ten years, might yet come into being. To us, 
who know what Rome became in after days, 
it seems strange indeed that the kingdoms 
which she was destined to crush one after 
another should not have joined with Carthage 
in the attempt to destroy her. If Macedonia, 
Syria, and Egypt could have combined while 
Hannibal had still a footing in Italy, she could 
hardly have survived. But they were too 
jealous of each other, or too short-sighted. 
Possibly they were unwilling to make Carthage, 

which the Greeks had no reason to love, too 

224 



HANNIBAL'S LAST BATTLE 225 

powerful. And what was not clone after 
Cannae would hardly be attempted after the 
Metaurus. Anyhow, Hannibal remained in 
Italy for four years after Hasdrubal's death. 
He now held only the extreme south of the 
Peninsula, and the limits of the region which 
he occupied were slowly contracted by the 
loss of town after town. Still he clung to his 
position ; he could have gone at any time ; but 
he could not bear to give up the dominating 
hope of his life, and he lingered on. At last, 
late in the year 203, in obedience to an urgent 
summons from home, he embarked his army. 
No attempt was made to hinder him. The 
Romans indeed were unfeignedly glad to see 
his departure. They had lost three hundred 
thousand men during the fifteen years of his 
stay. The huge dragon of his dream had 
indeed desolated Italy. It is said that when 
he took his last look of the land where he 
had met with such successes and such disap- 
pointments, he bitterly reproached his country- 
men for the grudging support which they had 
given him. "It is not the Roman people, so 
often routed in the field, it is Hanno " — the 
leader of the Peace party in Carthage — "that 
has vanquished me." The charge can hardly 
have been true ; but it is natural to one who 

16 



226 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

had finally to abandon one of the most 
splendid schemes that man ever devised. Livy 
adds that Hannibal now bitterly regretted 
that he had not led his troops against 
Rome immediately after the great victory of 
Cannae. 

It is needless to dwell on the events that 
followed Hannibal's return to Africa. We have 
not, indeed, the means of drawing out a quite 
clear and consistent narrative of them. The 
romantic story in which Syphax, Masinissa, 
and Sophonisba (daughter of Hasdrubal, son 
of Gisco) play the chief parts, does not belong 
to my subject, and I pass on at once to the 
battle of Zama. 

Hannibal ranged his elephants, as usual, in 
front of his line. Immediately behind them 
were the mercenaries, a mixed multitude, to 
whom Polybius applies the famous verse in 
which Homer describes the many-tongued 
battle-cry of the Trojans and their allies. Be- 
hind these mercenaries were the native Cartha- 
ginians, brought once more into the field by the 
extremity of their country, and in the rear of 
all, as a reserve which in the last resort might 
restore the fortunes of the day, the veterans 
whom Hannibal had brought with him from 
Italy. Scipio departed in one particular from 



HANNIBAL'S LAST BATTLE 227 

the usual rules of Roman tactics. Usually the 
intervals in the front line were filled up in the 
second, and the intervals in the second filled 
up in the third. On the present occasion the 
intervals were continuous, giving a free passage 
from the front of the army to the rear. This 
was done with a view to lessening the danger 
from the elephants. For the same reason the 
space between the lines was made greater 
than usual. The more space these animals 
were allowed in which they might move, the 
less likely, Scipio thought, they would be to 
trample down the ranks of his men. Laelius with 
the Roman cavalry occupied the left wing, with 
the native Carthaginian horse opposed to him ; 
Masinissa on the right had a body of African 
horse fronting men of the same or kindred 
nationalities in the service of Carthage. The 
elephants were of even less use and did even 
more damage to their friends than usual. The 
stock of trained animals had been long since 
exhausted, and the untaught creatures now 
brought into the field were unmanageable. In 
this instance they turned against the Cartha- 
ginian cavalry, and put them into such dis- 
order that Lselius won an easy victory over 
them. On the Roman right Masinissa, one 
of the best cavalry officers that the world has 



228 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

ever seen, defeated his antagonists. But in 
the centre the victory was less easily won. 
The mercenaries were veteran soldiers skilled 
in all the arts of war, and they more than held 
their own against the Roman infantry, largely 
consisting of recruits. If they had been pro- 
perly backed up by the Carthaginians behind 
them, they might have changed the fortunes of 
the day. But the citizen soldiers remained 
stolidly in their places. It was only when they 
were themselves attacked — the mercenaries, we 
are told, enraged at being thus deserted, turned 
against them — that they drew their swords. 
The line of veterans, under Hannibal's personal 
command, made a fierce and obstinate resist- 
ance. It was only when they were charged on 
both flanks by the victorious cavalry that they 
gave way. After this the rout was general. 
Twenty thousand men were left dead on, the 
field of battle, and as many more were taken 
prisoners. Of the conquerors fifteen hundred 
fell. It was not a high price to pay for the 
victory that, as Polybius puts it, " gave to Rome 
the sovereignty of the world." Hannibal 
made his way to Adrumetum, and from 
thence to Carthage with a body of six thousand 
troops. 

The terms of peace were unexpectedly 



HANNIBAL'S LAST BATTLE 229 

lenient. Carthage was to retain its inde- 
pendence, and its African possessions. But it 
was to pay an annual tribute of two hundred 
talents and an indemnity of ten thousand, 
and it was to retain only ten ships of war. 
Hannibal was so strongly impressed with the 
necessity of accepting these terms that he 
forcibly pulled back into his seat a senator who 
had risen to speak against them. 

A few lines may be given to the after history 
of this remarkable man, the most formidable 
enemy that Rome ever had, equally great as 
statesman and as general. 

Not long after the conclusion of peace he 
left Carthage, avoiding by his voluntary depar- 
ture a demand that Rome was preparing to 
make for his extradition. He was suspected, 
and probably with justice, of still cherishing 
hostile designs. He took refuge with Antiochus, 
of Syria, surnamed, but not for very convincing 
reasons, the Great. Antiochus was flattered 
by his presence, but showed a ridiculous 
jealousy of his genius. He would not employ 
him or even take his advice. A combination 
against Rome among the Eastern powers was 
still possible, and Hannibal strongly urged that 
it should be made, but he urged it in vain. In 
192 he was indeed put in command of the 



230 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

Syrian fleet, largely consisting, it may be pre- 
sumed, of Phoenician ships. He was attacked 
by a superior force from Rhodes, then the 
greatest naval power in the world, and was 
defeated. Two years afterwards the great 
battle of Magnesia was fought. Whether 
Hannibal was present we do not know, but he 
was certainly not in command. Possibly an 
anecdote that is told of him belongs to this 
time. King Antiochus showed him his army, 
splendid with gold and silver. " Will not this 
be enough for the Romans ? " asked the king. 
"Yes, indeed," answered the veteran, "though 
they are the greediest people upon earth." But 
it was of the value of their spoils, not of the 
efficiency of their weapons, that he was think- 
ing. The battle ended in the total defeat of 
Antiochus and his splendid army. Two years 
later he made peace with Rome, one of the 
conditions being that he should banish from his 
dominions all the enemies of Rome. Hannibal 
had anticipated the decree. He visited various 
places, and found at last what promised to be 
a final refuge with Prusias, King of Bithynia. 
But Prusias quarrelled with a neighbour, 
Eumenes, King of Pergamum, and Eumenes 
was a friend of Rome. Rome sent to Prusias 
to demand the person of his guest, and the 



HANNIBAL'S LAST BATTLE 231 

veteran — he was now in his sixty-fifth year — 
took poison. He carried the drug about with 
him in a ring, so the story runs, to be used in 
such an emergency. 



X 



THE BLOTTING OUT OF CARTHAGE 

FOR fifty years after the conclusion of the 
Peace of Hannibal, as the treaty described 
in my last chapter came to be called, Carthage 
and Rome continued to live on uneasy terms of 
mutual suspicion. Rome dreaded the rapid 
recovery in power and wealth of her old enemy ; 
Carthage feared, and doubtless with more 
reason, the inextinguishable hatred of the State 
which she had once brought so near to destruc- 
tion. The conditions imposed after Zama had 
not prevented the accumulation of wealth in 
the vanquished city. Her commerce had been 
left her untouched ; commerce meant a full 
treasury, and it was with her treasury that 
Carthage had always made war. There were 
two men who had much to do with embittering 
this quarrel, though neither of them lived to 

see the end which they desired. 

232 



THE BLOTTING OUT OF CARTHAGE 233 

Of one of these two, Masinissa, I have 
already had occasion to speak. He was the 
son of a Numidian king, and in early life 
had been an energetic ally of Carthage. He 
served in the Spanish campaigns of Hasdrubal 
(brother of Hannibal) with a strong contingent 
of Numidian horsemen. Even the defeat of 
the Metaurus did not shake his loyalty. In 
the following year, however, he began to think 
of changing sides, and he finally came to an 
agreement with Scipio that he would do his 
best to help the Roman cause, when the war 
should have been transferred to Africa. He 
had strong personal motives for this change. 
He had been deprived of the succession to his 
father's kingdom by the action of Syphax, a 
neighbouring potentate who was in close 
alliance with Carthage, and he had also seen 
his promised wife, Sophonisba (daughter of 
Hasdrubal Gisco), given to the same rival. 
Such then were the causes which made him a 
prominent actor in the battle of Zama. The 
Peace of Hannibal left Masinissa in undis- 
puted possession of his hereditary dominions, 
increased by the kingdom of Syphax. For the 
next fifty years he was perpetually on the watch 
to aggrandise himself at the expense of 
Carthage. Again and again he seized some 



234 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

desirable region belonging to that State, was 
met with protests which he uniformly dis- 
regarded, and was sustained in his usurpation 
by Rome, whose commissioners were secretly 
instructed, we are told, to favour so useful an 
ally. In 150 b.c. these continual feuds ended 
in open war. Masinissa, who was still 
vigorous and active, though he had reached his 
eighty-eighth year, defeated the Carthaginians 
in a pitched battle. Two years afterwards he 
died. 

The other persistent enemy of Carthage was 
M. Porcius Cato, commonly known as Cato the 
Censor or Cato the Elder. Born in 234 b.c, 
Cato was just of an age to serve in the army 
when Hannibal invaded Italy. We do not 
know whether he was present at any of the 
great battles, but he was certainly aide-de-camp 
to Fabius at the siege of Tarentum in 209. He 
never forgot the scenes which he witnessed 
when Hannibal was ravaging Italy ; and when 
he had risen to a high place in the State, he 
devoted himself to obtaining what he con- 
sidered a satisfactory vengeance. He lost no 
opportunity of impressing upon his countrymen 
his conviction that Carthage should not be 
permitted to exist. It is related of him that 
whatever the question before the Senate might 



THE BLOTTING OUT OF CARTHAGE 235 

be, he would add to his opinion, 1 "and I also 
think that Carthage ought to be blotted out." 
He died in 149 B.C., in his eighty-fifth year. 
It was in this year that the Third Punic War 
commenced. Cato had succeeded, it would 
seem, in the great object of his life. Rome 
was determined that Carthage should be 
blotted out. It is probable, indeed, that other 
motives besides the national and political were 
at work. The commercial interest was very 
powerful in Rome, and to this interest the 
destruction of a successful rival, which had long 
commanded most of the markets of the Medi- 
terranean coast, seemed most desirable. 2 Any- 
how, the terms proposed when the Carthaginian 
envoys were introduced into the Senate at 
Rome were such that it was manifest that war 
was determined upon. When the first con- 
ditions, onerous as they were, were accepted, 
then fresh severities were added. The ultima- 

1 The presiding magistrate put the question to every 
senator in turn. 

2 The influence of the commercial party may be seen in 
the destruction of Corinth in the same year that saw the 
fall of Carthage 3 for the policy followed in the case of 
Carthage many reasons could be given, but the destruction 
of Corinth was certainly indefensible. No one could 
pretend that it would ever be dangerous to Rome. The 
act was one of commercial jealousy pure and simple. 



236 ROME AND CARTHAG 

turn was that the Carthaginians must give up 
their city to be destroyed. They would them- 
selves be spared, and might retain a portion of 
their property, but their new habitation must not 
be within ten miles of the sea. This was meant 
to be impossible, and it had the effect which 
was desired. When the envoys returned and 
related the terms which had been finally imposed, 
the popular fury burst out. Those who had 
been prominent in advising the negotiations for 
peace were massacred, and the envoys them- 
selves shared their fate. The Senate, in the 
face of such a demonstration, could but come to 
one decision. It declared war against Carthage. 
It is needless to tell in detail the events of the 
two first two campaigns. The Romans led, it 
would seem, by incompetent generals, were not 
so successful as had been expected, and by the 
close of the summer of 147 little or no pro- 
gress had been made. In fact, the Romans 
were rather worse off than when they began. 
Their African allies began to doubt whether 
they had chosen the right side. Masinissa's 
sons in particular were wavering. They hardly 
knew, indeed, what to wish. If Carthage were 
to fall into the hands of Rome, -their own turn 
would soon come. Probably the best thing 
that could happen would be to have a feeble 



THE BLOTTING OUT OF CARTHAGE 237 

Carthage, not able to oppress its neighbours, 
but still preserving an independent existence as 
a " buffer-state " between themselves and Rome. 
Then with the appointment of the younger 
Scipio 1 to the supreme command of the armies 
in Africa a great change came over the scene. 
He had been serving as a Military Tribune 
(about equivalent in rank to a Brigadier- 
General), and had distinguished himself by his 
courage and intelligence. When the elections 
in Rome came on he went home, nominally to 
stand for the ./Edileship, but probably with 
higher views. He was thirty-seven years of 
age, and so five years under the legal age for 
the Consulship. But to the Consulship he 
was elected. The presiding officer protested in 
vain. The people would have it so, and the 
president yielded. And when the ballot for 
provinces took place, Scipio's colleague yielded 
again, and Africa, to which indeed he seemed 
to have an hereditary right, was assigned to 
him. 

1 The younger Scipio was the grandson by adoption, and 
the nephew by marriage, of the Elder Scipio. He was the 
son of L. iEmilius Paullus, and was adopted by the Elder 
Scipio's son Publius, whose feeble health had prevented 
him from taking any part in public life. Publius's mother 
was a sister of ^Emilius Paullus, and therefore aunt of the 
younger Scipio by blood and grandmother by adoption. 



238 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

He sailed at once for Carthage, and began 
by rescuing one of the generals who were about 
to be superseded from a dangerous position 
into which his imprudence had led him. Then 
he set the affairs of the army in order. The 
camp was cleared of a crowd of idlers, soldiers' 
servants, sutlers, and dealers. Then active 
operations were begun. A suburb of the city, 
called Megara, where the wealthier citizens had 
their homes, was taken. It was soon relin- 
quished, indeed, for it was found too costly to 
keep, but this success led to the abandonment 
of the camp which had been fortified outside 
the walls, and which was the first line of 
defence. The city was now almost invested. 
On the land side the blockade was complete, 
and no more supplies could be introduced ; and 
now Scipio began to block up the mouth of the 
harbour. But here the besieged foiled him. 
They built a fleet of fifty ships, and they dug a 
new channel from the inner harbour to the open 
sea. The Romans were taken by surprise. 
They had no idea that a fleet was being built, 
and they saw it for the first time when it issued 
from a harbour which was also a new creation. 
If the Carthaginians had acted at once, for they 
found the Roman fleet wholly unprepared for 
action, they might at least postponed the end. 



THE BLOTTING OUT OF CARTHAGE 239 

But they contented themselves with a demon- 
stration. A day or two after there was a drawn 
battle between the two fleets, but when the 
conflict was renewed on the morrow, the 
advantage rested with Rome. But the 
resources of the besieged were not exhausted. 
An attack was made on the city on the land- 
side, and battering-rams were brought up to 
the walls. But the besieged made a determined 
sally, drove back the assailants, and burnt their 
engines. During the winter Scipio busied 
himself with cutting off the supplies that the 
city still received from the interior. He also 
routed an army of native allies which had been 
gathered for its relief. 

In 146 the siege was pressed with renewed 
vigour. The harbour of the warships and 
the Lower City were occupied after a feeble 
resistance. Then the Upper City was attacked. 
The struggle here was long and fierce ; the 
houses had to be taken one by one. Each was 
obstinately defended, in each many non-com- 
batants perished. This was kept on for seven 
days and nights. The Romans fought in 
relief parties ; but Scipio never rested. He 
snatched such food and sleep as chance threw 
in his way, and was never absent from his post 
of leader. At last nothing but the citadel was 



240 ROME AND CARTHAGE 

left. A deputation was sent to Scipio offering 
to surrender on the single condition that the 
lives of the prisoners should be spared. Scipio 
granted this prayer, but excepted the deserters. 
Fifty thousand men, women, and children 
availed themselves of the conqueror's mercy, 
and gave themselves up. Only Hasdrubal and 
his family, his chief officers, and the deserters 
were left. The citadel was impregnable, but 
it could be reduced by hunger. Then Has- 
drubal contrived to escape from his companions, 
and creeping into the presence of Scipio, 
begged for his life. This was granted, not 
because the suppliant deserved any mercy, but 
because he could make himself useful to the con- 
queror. A tragic scene followed. Hasdrubal's 
wife had observed with disgust her husband's 
pusillanimity. Leading her two children by 
the hand, she advanced to the front of the wall. 
For Scipio she had no reproaches, but on her 
husband she invoked every curse that she had 
at her command. Then she stabbed her 
children, threw them into the flames, for the 
deserters, resolved not to fall into Roman 
hands, had set fire to the citadel, and followed 
them herself. By the express orders of the 
Senate, but against the wishes of Scipio, the 
whole city was burnt. He is said to have burst 



THE BLOTTING OUT OF CARTHAGE 241 

into tears as he looked on the conflagration, 
after repeating the well-known lines from the 
Iliad (vi. 417-8), in which the great champion 
of Troy foretells the doom of the city. 

" The day wherein Ilium the holy shall perish, will come ; 
it is near 
Unto Priam withal, and the folk of the king of the ashen 
spear." 



17 



BOOK V 

ROME AND THE BARBARIANS. 
THE RISE 

I. THE DAY OF ALLIA 

ONE Roman historian tells us that his 
countrymen believed that while their 
valour could easily overcome all other dangers, 
a contest with the Gauls must be for existence 
and not for fame ; another remarks that the 
Senate never neglected any tidings that might 
reach it of a movement among this people. 
For such movements there was a special name, 1 
and a special reserve of treasure was laid up in 
the Capitol to be employed when this particular 
danger threatened the State. There were 
Gauls, as the classical atlas tells us, on either 
side of the Alps. The tribes that dwelt south 
of the Alps were unquiet neighbours to the 

1 Tumultus. 
242 



THE DAY OF ALU A 243 

Latin nations, but the real danger arose when 
a swarm of invaders from beyond the mountains, 
moved by the love of adventure, or driven by 
famine, descended on the fertile plains of 
Northern Italy. The first invasion of which 
we have any detailed account took place in 
the early part of the fourth century B.C. 

The true story of this event has, as usual, 
been not a little overgrown with legend. It 
was said that the Gauls, under their king 
Brennus, were induced to attack the Etrurian 
town of Clusium by one of its citizens, who 
hoped thus to avenge a private injury in- 
flicted by a powerful noble who could not 
be reached by the law. 1 The inhabitants, 
alarmed by the formidable appearance of the 
invading host, sent envoys to Rome begging 
for help. Livy tells us that there was no 
alliance between the two towns. All that the 
Clusines could plead was that they had remained 
neutral in the long war between Rome and 
Veii, an Etrurian town, which it would have 
been natural to help. The Romans sent 

1 A very similar story is told of the coming of the Moors 
into Spain. It is quite possible that in both cases the 
invaders may have received help, in the way of guidance or 
information, from some one who had an injury to avenge ; 
but the national movement itself must have had some 
deeper and more powerful cause, 



244 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

envoys to the Gauls, three brothers belonging 
to the Fabian house (not a very likely thing, one 
would imagine), with a message to this effect : 
" Clusium is a friendly State ; we must help 
it even by force of arms, if that should be 
necessary, when it is wantonly attacked. But 
we wish to avoid war if it is possible. Let the 
Gauls explain what they want." The Gallic 
leaders replied that they too preferred to be on 
good terms with the Romans, who, from the 
fact that their help had thus been asked, were 
evidently brave men. What they wanted from 
the Clusines was a portion of land. They had 
more than they could use, whereas the Gauls 
had none. The Roman envoys made an in- 
dignant reply. " By what right do you demand 
land from its lawful possessors ; what have you 
Gauls to do with an Etrurian town ?" " Our 
rights," said the Gauls, "is in the point of our 
swords ; as for property, all things belong to 
the brave." The conference broke up, and 
both parties prepared for battle. In the conflict 
that ensued the brothers Fabii took a prominent 
part. So conspicuous was their valour that it 
could not but be noticed both by friend and 
foe ; one of them in particular was recognised 
as he was stripping the arms from a Gallic 
chieftain whom he had slain in single combat. 



The day of alliA 245 

The Gauls now suspended all hostilities against 
Clusium. They were bent on demanding 
satisfaction from Rome for this gross offence 
against the law of nations. The more 
impetuous spirits were for marching against 
the offending city, but the older and more 
prudent counsellors prevailed when they sug- 
gested that envoys should be sent to represent 
their wrongs, and to claim redress. The envoys 
came, and were heard by the Senate, which 
acknowledged the transgression of the Fabii, 
but hesitated to accede to the demand that the 
guilty should be given up. Unable or unwill- 
ing to come to a decision, they referred the 
matter to the General Assembly of the People. 
Here there was little chance of justice being 
done. The proposition that these brave nobles 
should be given up was at once scouted. The 
Fabii's were not only not punished, but were 
actually elected Military Tribunes I for the 

1 These officers, "Military Tribunes with Consular power/' 
to give their full title, were sometimes elected in place of 
the two Consuls. According to Livy this was done nearly 
fifty times between the years 445-367 B.C. The arrange- 
ment had its origin in the difficulty between the patricians 
and the plebeians. The former could not reconcile them- 
selves to the ideas of a plebeian consul. After the recon- 
ciliation of the two orders by the compromise known as the 
Licinian Rogations, it was not done again. 



246 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

ensuing year. No one thought of the step 
usually taken in an emergency, the appoint- 
ment of the ablest soldier available as 
dictator. Even the ordinary preparations 
for meeting a formidable enemy were 
neglected. 

Meanwhile the Gauls were advancing on 
Rome, thinking of nothing but vengeance on 
this insolent city. The appearance of their 
host terrified the inhabitants of the country 
through which they passed, but they did not 
turn aside to attack or plunder any of the 
towns on their route. They gave it to be 
understood that all their quarrel was with 
Rome. 

Roused at length to a sense of their danger 
by the frequent messengers who came hurrying 
in from the north the Romans hastily got 
together such troops as they could find, and 
marched out to meet the enemy, who had now 
advanced as far as the river Allia, little more 
than eleven miles from the city. Livy tells us 
that the generals formed no camp, constructed 
no rampart to protect them in case of a reverse, 
and offered no sacrifice. The battle-line had 
to be widely extended if they were to be pro- 
tected against a flanking movement ; but this 
could not be done without perilously weakening 



THE DAY OF ALU A 2tf 

the centre. It mattered, however, little or 
nothing what arrangements were or were not 
made. There was nothing like a battle ; only 
a blind* panic and headlong flight. " No 
lives," says Livy, "were lost in battle." But 
thousands were cut down in the pursuit, while 
the fugitives, so densely packed was the 
throng, hindered each other from escaping ; 
many perished on the Tiber bank, where they 
stood helpless, the enemy behind, the im- 
passable stream in front ; not a few were 
drowned, some who, unable to swim, yet threw 
themselves into the stream, in the wild hope 
of somehow struggling through, or, being 
swimmers, were weighed down by their heavy 
armour. Of those who escaped the greater 
part made their way to Veii. These neglected 
to send any tidings of their safety to Rome. 
Those who reached Rome did not even stop to 
shut the gates of the city, but hurried to take 
possession of the Capitol. 

All this sounds very romantic, not to say 
improbable. It is strange to find these 
barbarous Gauls so strict in demanding an 
observance of international laws. And then 
the battle — there was, indeed, nothing Roman 
about it. Where were the three Fabii, all 
in high command, whose valour had been so 



248 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

conspicuous at Clusium, but on the Allia are 
unable either to rally their soldiers or to strike 
a blow for themselves ? And the sacrifices — 
is it credible that so regular a custom, observed 
almost mechanically, was for this one occasion 
omitted ? And the behaviour of the fugitives 
— what could be more unlikely? If they were 
in too great a hurry to shut the city gates, 
were there no old men or boys to do it ? Livy 
manifestly piles up every possible neglect or 
misdoing to heighten the dramatic contrast 
between reckless pride and humiliating defeat. 
But that a great disaster occurred at the Allia, 
it is impossible to doubt. Allia was, indeed, 
as Virgil calls it, infaustum nomen, an ill-starred 
name. For centuries afterwards its anni- 
versary, the 15th of July, Dies Alliensis, was 
marked as one on which no public business 
could be transacted. When Tacitus wishes to 
describe the height of reckless impiety in 
Vitellius, one of the short-lived Emperors who 
succeeded one another after the fall of the 
Julian Caesars, he says that he was so regard- 
less of all law, human or divine, that he 
actually published an edict on the fatal Day of 
Allia. 

The story goes on in the same romantic 
style. But a sudden change comes over the 



THE DAY OF ALU A 249 

whole temper of the nation, from the highest 
to the lowest. Impiety, recklessness, and 
cowardice give place to reverence, prudence, 
and constancy. The Capitol, the last hope of 
Rome, is to be held by its picked warriors. 
No one is to consume its scanty stores who 
cannot contribute his full share to its defence. 
The populace obey without a murmur, and 
flock out of the city, seeking a refuge where 
they may, or remain to await their doom. 
The old nobles who have borne high office, 
consuls, praetors, and senators, will not leave 
the city but will abide, each in his robes of 
office and chair of state, the coming of the foe ; 
the holy things from temple and shrine are 
either buried or conveyed to some place of 
safety. Now all is dignity as before all was 
disgrace. 

The story goes on in the same romantic 
style — the venerable old men, treated at first 
with reverence, are slaughtered when one of 
them resents with a blow of his ivory sceptre 
a barbarian's too familiar touch. The Capitol 
is closely invested, resolutely defended, but 
almost lost by the carelessness of the sentries. 
The besiegfers had either observed the track of 
one of the messengers who had carried some 
communication from the garrison to the outer 



250 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

world, or had discovered the place where the 
ascent was not too difficult to attempt. They 
make the venture one moonlight night — one 
would think that the moonlight would be more 
of a hindrance than a help — and almost suc- 
ceed. The watch has neglected its duty ; the 
very dogs are asleep. But Roman piety saves 
the last refuge of Rome. There was a flock 
of sacred geese in the temple of Juno, and 
these had been not only spared but fed, hard 
pressed as the garrison had been for food. 
And now they give warning of the enemy's 
approach. Manlius, one of the most dis- 
tinguished veterans in the garrison, for he had 
been Consul, is roused by their clamour, hurries 
to the edge of the height, hurls one man down 
by driving his shield into his face, slays others, 
and gives the garrison time to assemble. 

But though the Capitol is not to be taken by 
force, it cannot stand out against hunger. 
Negotiations are opened, for the Gauls have 
somehow given it to be understood that they 
are ready to depart if a sufficient price can be 
paid. A thousand pounds weight of gold is 
agreed upon for the ransom. As the weighing 
is going on one of the Romans complains that 
the weights are unfair. Thereupon the in- 
solent Gaul throws his sword into the scale, 



THE DAY OF ALU A 251 

uttering words that were beyond all bearing 
to a Roman ear, "Woe to the vanquished!" 

But the gods will not allow the most pious 
of nations to suffer this last humiliation. 
Before the price can be handed over to these 
insulting barbarians, the greatest of Roman 
soldiers appears upon the scene, orders scales 
and gold to be removed, bids the Gauls 
prepare for conflict, and defeats them, first in 
the Forum itself, and afterwards at the eighth 
milestone from Rome, as completely as they 
had themselves routed the Romans at Allia. 

We need not endeavour to disentangle the 
true from the false in this story. That Roman 
pride covered a humiliating fall is plain enough, 
and we may well doubt the too opportune 
arrival of the victorious Camillus. But it is 
certainly true that Rome recovered with 
amazing rapidity from what might well have 
been an overwhelming blow. In the first three 
centuries and a half of her existence Rome has 
made so little progress that she has still a rival 
city not more than ten miles from her gates. 
She is reduced to her last stronghold, and has 
to ransom even that. Nevertheless in the 
course of another century and a half she is in 
undisputed possession of the whole of Italy. 
It has been suggested, not without proba- 



252 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

bility, that the other Italian peoples suffered 
even more from this barbarian deluge, and that 
the Roman arms when once the acute crisis 
had passed encountered a less formidable 
resistance. 



II 



APOLLO THE DEFENDER 



WE need not follow the story of Rome 
and the Gauls through its details. 
Time after time we find them leagued with the 
nations of Italy, when these were at war with 
the great power which was slowly compelling 
them either to subjection or to alliance. We 
find them, for instance, fighting side by side 
with the Samnites at Sentinum (295 B.C.), and 
with the Etrurians at the Vadimonian Lake 
(283 B.C.). But they made no really formidable 
attack on Rome for a long period after 390. 
The early part of the third century b.c. was a 
period of great unrest among the tribes on 
both sides of the Alps. In 279 this culminated 
in an invasion of Southern Europe so formidable 
that though Rome was not immediately con- 
cerned with it, some account of it must be 
given. 

According to the narrative of Pausanias, 
who introduces the story as a digression in 



253 



254 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

his description of Delphi, the Gauls invaded 
Greece under the leadership of a certain 
Brennus, the same name, it will be observed, 
as that borne by the conqueror of Rome (the 
word Brennus has been said to mean "king" ; 
but Celtic scholars are not agreed upon the 
point). His forces are said to have amounted 
to 150,000 infantry, a figure on which the 
authorities are fairly unanimous, and cavalry 
variously estimated at from 60,000 to io.ooo. 1 
The Greeks, though in a very depressed con- 
dition, roused themselves to resist. It was not 
a choice, as it had been two centuries before, 
between freedom and servitude ; it was a 
question of life or death. The barbarians 
spared no one, and if they could not be 
checked in their advance, Greece would be 
turned into a desert. The stand was to be 
made, as of old, at Thermopylae. The com- 
parison between the forces led by Leonidas 
and those now assembled is interesting. The 
most numerous contingent was from a nation 
which scarcely appears in the history of Greece 
at its best days, the ^tolians. " Very 

1 Pausanias says that every trooper had two mounted 
attendants, themselves practised warriors and ready to 
supply him with a fresh horse, or even to take his place in 
the ranks. They must have had therefore much mobility, 
a phrase with which we have lately become very familiar. 



APOLLO THE DEFENDER 255 

numerous and including every arm," says 
Pausanias. Their heavy-armed infantry num- 
bered 9,000. The other figures he does not 
give, or they have disappeared from his text. 
The whole force may have amounted to 
between thirty and forty thousand. 

A battle that was fought in the Pass ended 
greatly to the advantage of the Greeks. The 
Gauls with their long and unwieldy swords 
and cumbrous shields were no match for their 
antagonists, though they fought with desperate 
valour. Their cavalry, the strongest arm they 
possessed, could not act on account of the 
nature of the ground. The result was that 
they were driven back with very heavy loss, 
while the Greeks had but forty killed. 

Brennus, who seems to have had some 
military ability, seems to have become aware 
that the yfLtolians made up the most numerous 
and effective part of the Greek army. He 
conceived the idea of detaching them by 
sending a force under his second-in-command 
to ravage ^Etolia. The stratagem succeeded. 
The ./Etolians, on hearing of the movement, 
hastened to march to the defence of their 
country. They were too late to save two of 
their frontier towns, which were stormed and 
sacked in the most brutal manner. But they 



256 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

were in time to exact a heavy vengeance from 
the barbarians. Of the fifty thousand who 
had been detached on this expedition, less 
than half returned to the camp at Thermopylae. 

The incidents that followed bear a curious 
resemblance to the history of the first defence 
of Thermopylae. The path by which the 
Persians, through the treachery of Ephialtes, 
were able to take the defenders of the pass 
in the rear was again used for the same 
purpose. The Phocian pickets were surprised 
as before, being hindered by the mist from 
seeing the Gauls till these were close upon 
them. But there was no obstinate deter- 
mination among the Greeks to die upon 
the ground. They were carried off by the 
Athenian fleet, which from the first had been 
in attendance, keeping as close as possible to 
the shore. 

The object which now roused the cupidity 
of the barbarians was the shrine of Delphi 
with its treasury, still rich in the offerings of 
many generations of worshippers and inquirers, 
though it had not altogether escaped the hand 
of the spoiler. 1 As in the Persian war, 

1 The treasury was robbed by the Phocians in 346, in 
what was called the Second Sacred War. The Phocians 
were condemned to make restitution by paying a fine of 



APOLLO THE DEFENDER 257 

the terrified inhabitants inquired of the god 
whether they should remove or conceal the 
sacred treasure. Again, as before, the answer 
was that the god would take care of his own. 
" I will provide, and with me the Maidens 
veiled in white," were the words of the oracle. 
The greater part of the army mustered at 
Thermopylae had gone home ; but there were 
some thousands who remained to protect 
Delphi. The god did not disdain to use their 
services, though the most effective protection 
came — so runs the story — from his own inter- 
ference. The ground on which the Gauls had 
pitched their camp was shaken throughout the 
day by repeated shocks of earthquake, while 
overhead the thunder rolled and the lightning 
flashed incessantly. Through the darkened 
atmosphere might be seen the flashing arms 
of warriors who were more than mortal — one 
of them, it was said, the hero Pyrrhus, son 
of Achilles, who had met his death at Delphi 
many centuries before, and had ever since 
been worshipped as a local hero. That day, 

10,000 talents (^2, 500,000), but it is certain that they were 
never able to pay this amount. We may be sure, on the 
other hand, that many offerings had been made in the 
intervening time, and that as the treasury had remained 
intact for twenty years, it probably contained considerable 
wealth. 

18 



258 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

however, the Gauls held their own ; many of 
the Phocians, in particular, were slain. But 
the night that followed was one of terrible 
suffering. A sharp frost set in, and following 
the frost came a heavy fall of snow. The 
snow symbolised "the maidens vested in 
white " — such, at least, was the rationalistic 
explanation given in after years. Nor was 
this all : great masses of stone from Parnassus, 
and rolling into the camp of the barbarians 
crushed as many as twenty or thirty by a 
single blow. The next day the Greek garrison 
at Delphi advanced against the invaders, the 
main body making a front attack, the Phocians, 
who were well acquainted with the country, 
assailing the rear. The Gauls did not lack 
in courage or firmness. Suffering though they 
did intensely from the cold, they made a 
resolute stand, and did not retreat till their 
leader was severely wounded and carried 
fainting off the field. Again the night was 
more fatal than the day. After dark a panic 
fear fell upon the camp. The barbarians 
seemed to see and hear enemies everywhere, 
and turned their arms upon each other. After 
this their destruction was certain. To a host 
without discipline a retreat is fatal. The Gauls 
were without stores, for they reckoned to be 



APOLLO THE DEFENDER 259 

supported by the countries through which they 
passed. But now the victorious enemy hung 
upon their rear, and cut off any stragglers that 
ventured to leave the main army. Famine 
and the incessant attacks of the pursuers 
reduced their numbers till there was but a 
scanty remnant of the great host that a few 
weeks before had descended on Northern 
Greece. Brennus, it is said, poisoned himself, 
unable to face his people at home after so 
disastrous a campaign. 

Pausanias tells us that not one of the in- 
vading Gauls quitted Greece alive. It is 
hardly probable that this is true ; and other 
writers gave a different account. What is 
certain is that one great division of the swarm 
that had descended from Northern into Southern 
Europe met with a very different fortune from 
that which overtook Brennus. This took a 
more easterly route, and plundering and de- 
stroying as it went reached the shores of the 
Hellespont. (This seems to have happened 
in 278 B.C., the year after that in which Delphi 
had been attacked.) The Gauls cast covetous 
glances on the rich territories of Asia, now 
separated from them by only a narrow stretch 
of water, and in one or another contrived 
to reach them. One division seized a few 



260 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

small vessels and boats, and, as no sort of 
opposition was attempted, ferried themselves 
across ; the other was actually transported by 
an Asiatic Greek prince, who was contending 
with his brother for the kingdom of Bithynia. 
They secured the victory for him, but Bithynia, 
and indeed the whole of Western Asia Minor, 
paid a heavy price for their help. Their 
history during the next few years is very 
obscure, but we may gather that they roamed 
from province to province, laying waste all the 
countries which they traversed. The unwar- 
like inhabitants of Asia Minor were quite 
powerless to check them. After some twelve 
years Antiochus, King of Syria, son of one 
of the great generals trained by Alexander, 
undertook the task, and accomplished it with 
such success that he earned the surname of 
Soter, "the Saviour." He could not indeed 
expel them ; in fact, so far was their power 
from being broken that in 261 Antiochus lost 
his life in a battle with them. But the general 
result of the war was that the invaders were 
glad to settle down in a definite region which 
was ceded to them, and which was known by 
the name of Galatia, or Gallo-paecia. The 
Galatians afterwards played an important part 
in history. But with this we are not now 
concerned. 



II. 



THE SWARM FROM THE NORTH 

FOR a century and a half after the events 
recorded in my last chapter, no important 
southward movement of the northern nations 
took place. The destruction of one great host 
of Gaul and the permanent settlement of 
another in Western Asia must have diminished 
the population of the region beyond the Alps, 
and lightened the pressure on the means of 
living. Rome was not called upon to meet 
any powerful army of invaders ; a fortunate 
circumstance, when we consider the exhaustion 
that must have followed the terrible struggle 
of the Second Punic War. After the wars 
of the first half of the second century B.C., 
which practically reduced the successors of 
Alexander to insignificance, Rome even began 
to advance her frontiers northward. 

Curiously enough these successes had the 
effect of bringing down on the Republic a 



262 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

more formidable attack, the invasion led by 
Brennus not excepted, than she ever had had 
to meet before. For some years previous to 
the year 113 B.C., a homeless people called 
Cimbri, a word variously translated by friends 
and enemies as "champions" or "robbers," 
had been wandering about in the regions 
north of the Danube. The word suggests the 
well-known name of Cymri, but the resem- 
blance of sound is deceptive. The Cimbri 
were really of the Germanic stock. In fact a 
remnant of the tribe preserved the name for 
many years afterwards in what seems to have 
been its original habitation, the peninsula of 
Denmark. What cause drove them southward 
cannot be stated with certainty. An ancient 
writer records one account that had come to 
his ears, that large tracts of land occupied by 
the tribe on the shores of the Baltic had 
been overflowed by the sea, and that its in- 
habitants were compelled to migrate or to 
starve. The story seemed incredible to the 
writer who preserved it. To us, who can 
easily find a parallel in the history of the 
great migrations of mankind, it appears not 
improbable. And this, in the absence of 
evidence, which indeed is not likely to be 
forthcoming, is all that we can say. For 



THE SWARM FROM THE NORTH 263 

some time the Celtic tribes that occupied the 
banks of the Danube had kept the Cimbri 
from reaching that river. But when the Celts 
had been seriously weakened by the armies 
of Rome, they were no longer able, or, it may 
be, no longer willing to continue this resis- 
tance. It is quite likely indeed that they 
welcomed as allies the people which they had 
been accustomed to regard as enemies. One 
thing is certain, that either then, or during 
their previous wanderings, the Cimbri had 
added to their hosts many Celtic comrades. 
The Celts were better armed, more advanced 
in the military art, and — a most important 
consideration — more familiar with the Roman 
methods of warfare. Hence we are not 
surprised to find among the leaders of the 
invading host, Germanic as it was in the 
main, some unquestionably Celtic names. 

The movement was on a scale and of a kind 
new to Roman experience. It was no expedi- 
tion of warriors. The whole nation had come. 
The Cimbri had a vast array of waggons with 
them, containing their wives, their children, and 
all that belonged to them. There was a curious 
resemblance between them — something of the 
same kind may be seen to-day in a shipload of 
Scandinavian emigrants — for all were huge of 



264 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

stature, the women falling little short of the 
men, and all fair-haired. For weapons they 
had a javelin and a long sword ; every man 
carried a long narrow shield, and the chiefs 
among them were also protected by coats of 
mail. 

The first relation between the Romans and 
the Cimbri was not other than friendly. 
Papirius Carbo, the Consul in command of the 
Roman army, required them to abstain from 
interfering with the Taurisci, a Celtic tribe 
inhabiting the northern bank of the Danube, on 
the ground of being in alliance with Rome. 
The Cimbri did not refuse obedience. Then 
Carbo was guilty of a shameful act of treachery, 
which, as we shall see, met with its due reward. 
He offered the strangers guides, who were to 
lead them to a region which they might occupy 
without hindrance. These guides had in fact 
instructions to lead the Cimbri into an ambush 
which had been carefully prepared for them. 
The plot succeeded in a way, but the result was 
very different from what Carbo had expected. 
The Cimbri turned upon their betrayers, in- 
flicted upon them a heavy loss, and, but for the 
opportune breaking of a great storm over the 
battlefield, would have entirely destroyed them. 

The conquerors did not move southwards, as 



THE SWARM FROM THE NORTH 265 

might have been expected, but marching west 
through Northern Switzerland and South-eastern 
Gaul, remained quiet for a while. They were, 
however, still in need of land which they could 
call their own, and they asked the help of the 
Roman general who was in command at the 
frontier to help them in obtaining it. His own 
reply was to attack them, with no better result 
than a terrible slaughter among his troops and 
the loss of his camp. The Cimbri sent an 
embassy to Rome, repeating the request that 
they made to the Consul, and while they waited 
for the reply employed themselves in subju- 
gating their Celtic neighbours. 

Eight years had now passed since the defeat 
of Carbo, and the unexpected reprieve which 
Rome had enjoyed was at an end. The 
Cimbri, disappointed at receiving no reply to 
their demands from Rome, and recognising that 
it would be more profitable to invade Italy than 
to fight for less desirable regions in Gaul, 
marched to the Rhone under the command of 
their king Boiorix. The Romans had no less 
than three armies on the spot. The weakest 
of the three, commanded by the ex-Consul 
yEmilius Scaurus, was the first to be attacked. 
It was routed, and its commander taken 
prisoner. Brought before King Boiorix, 



266 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

Scaurus warned the invader not to venture on 
invading Italy, and was put to death for what 
was judged to be presumption. The two 
remaining armies were concentrated at Arausio, 
on the left bank of the Rhone. Unhappily the 
two officers in command were enemies. They 
would not occupy a common camp, nor would 
they deliberate on the plan of campaign that 
was to be followed. The result was a frightful 
disaster. It is possible that a conflict might 
have been avoided altogether. Even after the 
defeat of Scaurus the two consular armies pre- 
sented so formidable an appearance that Boiorix 
expressed himself willing to treat. Negotiations 
were actually in progress when Caepio, an ex- 
Consul, who was inferior in rank to the Consul 
Maximus, committed an act of surprising folly. 
Fearing that his colleague might gain all the 
credit if the negotiations with the Cimbri were 
successful, he attacked the enemy with the force 
under his immediate command. The battle of 
Arausio, fought on October 6, 105, was not less 
fatal than Allia and Cannae, followed as it was 
by the defeat of the other army. Eighty thou- 
sand soldiers are said to have been slain on the 
field, or to have perished in the retreat. 

At Rome the result was something like a 
revolution. The political history of the time is 



THE SWARM FROM THE NORTH 267 

outside my province. It will be enough, there- 
fore, to say that the most renowned general 
of the time, C. Marius, was put in supreme 
command. He was made Consul, in spite of 
the law that forbade especial election to this 
office, and he was continued in command for 
five years in succession. 

The Cimbri had not actually carried out their 
intention of invading Italy. They had turned 
aside to plunder South-western Gaul, and even 
to cross the Pyrenees into Spain. Marius made 
use of the delay, which it is scarcely too much 
to say was the salvation of Rome, to strengthen 
the defences of Northern Italy, to recall the 
wavering tribes of Cisalpine Gaul to their 
allegiances, and to find auxiliaries among the 
peoples which had as much reason as had Rome 
herself to dread the success of the Cimbri. 

This people had now received considerable 
reinforcements. They had been joined by some 
Helvetian tribes, and by the Teutones, old 
neighbours in Northern Europe, and now, by a 
curious chance, associated with them in their 
invasion of the south. The first intention of 
the allies was to force their way into Italy in 
one vast army. This was given up, probably 
on account of the mechanical difficulty connected 
with transport. It was finally arranged that 



268 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

the Teutones, with the Helvetian tribe of the 
Amburones and a Cimbrian contingent, were to 
invade Italy by the western passes of the Alps, 
and that the Cimbri, also reinforced by some 
Helvetians, should try the passes to the east. 
It is with the former of these two divisions that 
I am first concerned. 

Marius had taken up his position in a strongly 
fortified camp at the junction of the Rhone 
and the I sere. Here he resolutely refused to 
risk the chances of a battle. It was no ques- 
tion, he represented to the impatient spirits 
in his army, of victories and of triumphs, but 
of the safety of Rome, which would be lost 
if her last army were defeated. To the soldiers, 
who were not less impatient, he used different 
arguments, appealing, for instance, to their 
superstition. He affirmed that he was in 
possession of oracles which promised Rome 
a decisive victory, which was to be won, how- 
ever, at a certain place and time. There was 
a prophetess in his camp, a Syrian, very possibly 
a Jewess by birth, whom he professed to consult, 
and who, we may reasonably suppose, accom- 
modated her answers to his ideas of the military 
necessities of the time. The barbarians were 
encouraged by the inaction of the Romans to 
make an attack on the camp. They were 



THE SWARM FROM THE NORTH 269 

easily repulsed, and speedily abandoned the 
attempt, marching forward as if the Roman 
force might safely be neglected. For six days, 
so vast was their array of fighting-men and 
baggage, they filed past the camp, uttering 
insulting cries as they went. When they had 
passed, Marius broke up his camp and followed 
them. He never relaxed, however, his pre- 
cautions. He chose every night a strong 
position for his camp, and fortified it to resist 
an attack. At Aquae Sextise (Aix) l he deter- 
mined to bring the enemy to an engagement. 

The story ran that he deliberately chose a 
position for his camp where the supply of water 
was short, and that when the soldiers complained 
he pointed to the river that ran close to the 
position of the barbarians, saying, " There is 
drink, but you must buy it with blood." " Let 
us go then," cried the soldiers, " while our blood 
still flows in our veins." Marius insisted upon 
their first fortifying the camp. The legion was 
too well disciplined not to obey him, but there 
were others less amenable to discipline, and a 
collision with the enemy took place before the 
day was out. The camp followers, who had no 
water for their beasts, or even for themselves, 

1 About 15 miles to the north of Marseilles. It must be 
distinguished, of course, from Aix-les-Bains. 



270 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

flocked down to the river, having armed them- 
selves as well as they could. Here they came 
into collision with the Amburones, who, taken 
at first by surprise, soon recovered their courage, 
and raising their warcry with what is described 
as a terrific volume of sound, advanced to repel 
the new-comers. The light-armed Ligurians 
on the Roman side came to the help of their 
comrades, and these again were supported by 
some of the regular troops. The affair was a 
skirmish on a very large scale rather than a 
battle. The Romans had much the best of it, 
but they were far from feeling the security of 
conquerors. They spent the night under arms, 
expecting from hour to hour an assault upon 
their camp. 

The barbarians, however, were less confident 
than Marius supposed. For two days they 
remained inactive, and even then it was not 
they who challenged the conflict. Marius, 
who had great gifts as a general, had observed 
a convenient place in the rear of the enemy's 
position where an ambush might be con- 
veniently laid. Here he posted three thousand 
men under the command of Marcellus. In the 
battle that followed the unexpected onslaught 
of this force on the barbarian rear did much to 
decide the issue of the day. Attacked both in 



THE SWARM FROM THE NORTH 271 

front and in rear the Teutones gave way. To 
give way under such circumstances meant utter 
destruction. What the numbers of the slain 
and the captured may have been it is impossible 
to say. Levy says that 200,000 were slain, 
180,000 taken prisoners. Other authorities 
reduce the number of the slain by a half. 
One thing, however, is certain, that the 
Teutones ceased to exist. Those who did not 
fall on the field or in the rout put an end to 
their own lives. The women also killed them- 
selves rather than fall into the hands of the 
enemy. It is curious that the name of the 
tribe was preserved by the remnant left behind 
in its original seat when the great host 
migrated southward, and that it is now used 
to designate one of the great families of the 
human race. Marius was just about to set fire 
to a huge pile of the spoils of the dead when 
messengers from Rome reached the field, 
announcing that he had been elected for the 
fifth time to the Consulship. 

But Rome was not yet out of danger, for the 
Cimbri were yet to be accounted for. They 
had forced their way into Italy, Lutatius 
Catulus, the colleague of Marius in the Consul- 
ship, finding himself unable to stop them. His 
original intention had been to defend the passes 



272 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

of the Tyrol, but he relinquished the idea and 
took up a strong position on the Athesis 
(Adige). Even here he did not feel safe. His 
troops indeed were so terrified by the report of 
the barbarians' advance that they refused to 
remain, and Catulus, making a merit of neces- 
sity, putting himself at their head, retreated to 
the southern side of the Po, leaving the richest 
plains of Northern Italy to the mercy of the foe. 
When news of the threatening position of 
affairs reached Rome Marius was summoned to 
the capital to advise on the course to be pur- 
sued. As soon as he arrived the people, with 
whom he was in the very highest favour, 
offered him a triumph for his victory over the 
Teutones. He refused to accept the honour 
so long as the Cimbri remained on Roman 
soil. He at once went northwards, and sum- 
moning to him the Uite of his legions, marched 
to reinforce Catulus. He effected a junction 
with this general near Vercellae ( Vercelli). The 
Cimbri had not heard, it seems, of the disaster 
which had overtaken the Teutones, and put oft 
fighting in the hope of being joined by them. 
They even sent envoys to the Roman generals, 
demanding an allotment of land for themselves 
and their kinsmen. " We have given your 
kinsmen their portion, and they are not likely 



THE SWARM FROM THE NORTH 273 

to be disturbed in it," replied Marius with grim 
humour. " You shall pay dearly for your jest," 
they replied and prepared to depart. " Nay," 
said the Roman, " you must not depart without 
saluting your relatives," and he ordered the 
captive kings of the Teutones who had been 
captured in an attempt to cross the Alps to be 
produced. After this nothing remained but to 
fight with as little delay as possible. 

The combined forces of the Romans 
numbered between 50,000 and 60,000. We 
have no trustworthy account of the battle 
which followed, Plutarch's narrative being 
borrowed, it would seem, from writers not 
favourable to Marius, from Catulus himself, 
who left a history of his campaign, and from 
the notebook of Sylla, who was serving with 
Catulus. His story is that Marius missed his 
way in a dust-storm that suddenly swept over 
the plain, and that he wandered about vainly 
seeking the enemy till the battle had been 
practically decided by the courage of the troops 
commanded by Catulus and his lieutenant, 
Sulla. It is eertain, however, that at Rome 
the credit of the victory was, in the main, 
assigned to Marius. About one part of the 
battle there is, however, no doubt. Never has 
there been seen a more tragic spectacle. The 

19 



274 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

scene that closed the day at Aquce Sextice was 
repeated on a larger scale and with added 
horrors at the Campi Rauciii. 1 The Cimbrian 
women stood on the waggons robed in black. 
They slaughtered the fugitives when these 
sought temporary shelter behind the barricade, 
sparing neither father, brother, or husband. 
Then they slaughtered their children, and 
finally put an end to their own lives. As many 
as sixty thousand prisoners, however, were 
taken, while the number that fell on the field of 
battle is said to have been twice as great. The 
Cimbri perished as utterly as the Teutones. 

The triumph which Marius and his colleague 
celebrated on their return to Rome was indeed 
well deserved if we consider the consequences 
of the victory which it was given to reward. 
For more than two centuries Rome was not 
again called upon to fight for her life against 
barbarian foes. Her armies met indeed more 
than once with serious disasters, but these 
defeats were incurred in campaigns of aggres- 
sion. And if, as might easily happen, her 
frontiers were sometimes crossed, it was a mere 
matter of hordes of casual plunderers, whose 
movements did not really affect the general 
course of events. 

1 The spot cannot be identified, but it must have been 
near Vercellse. 



IV 



BEYOND THE PYRENEES 



\ \ TE have seen how Carthage, expelled 
V V from the islands that belonged to Italy, 
found compensation in Spain. When the issue 
of the Second Punic War was decided against 
her, and her domains were limited to Africa, 
Spain passed into Roman hands. Much of the 
country, however, had never acknowledged the 
rule of either power, and it required two 
centuries of effort before it became what it was 
for the first three centuries of our era, the most 
completely Latinized of all the Roman pro- 
vinces. 

The Carthaginians were finally driven from 
Spain in 206. We may pass quickly over the 
next fifty years. By degrees the Roman power 
advanced till the whole peninsula, some moun- 
tainous regions in the north and centre excepted, 
became subject to it. Rebellions were fre- 



275 



276 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

quent, for the Roman system was to change 
the provincial governors almost from year to 
year, and some of these officials were cruel and 
extortionate. As I am not writing a history 
either of Rome or of Spain, I must limit my- 
self to the most important and representative 
persons and events. 

Viriathus was a native of Lusitania, a region 
nearly corresponding to what is now called 
Portugal. His hatred of the Romans came 
from a shameful act of treachery from which 
his countrymen suffered at the hands of one of 
the Roman generals. This man had expressed 
his pity for the poverty of their country, which 
drove them, he said, into robbing their neigh- 
bours. He would give them, if they would 
trust him, lands better worth cultivating. 
What he did was to massacre them in detach- 
ments, one detachment being kept in ignorance 
of the fate of those who had gone before. 
Viriathus was one of the few who escaped. 

It was not for some time that he secured the 
complete confidence of his countrymen, or was 
able to collect an army with which he could 
meet his adversaries in the field. His first 
great success was won in 147 B.C., when the 
proprsetor Vetilius was drawn into an ambush 
and defeated. Vetilius was taken prisoner and 



BEYOND THE PYRENEES 277 

killed by his captors, who, seeing only a "very 
fat old man," did not recognise his value. Two- 
fifths of the army of ten thousand perished at 
the same time. Another disaster happened in 
the year following. Plautius, the Roman 
general, was deceived by a pretended retreat, 
and suffered a heavy loss of men. Affairs 
seemed to be in so serious a condition that the 
authorities at Rome resolved on sending a large 
force and as able a commander as they could 
find to the seat of war. The man they chose 
was Fabius, the brother of the younger Scipio, 
and a son therefore of the famous conqueror of 
Macedonia. x Before Fabius could reach the 
scene of war another Roman army had been 
almost destroyed. Fabius himself for a time 
could do but little. He had to content himself 
with getting his forces, all of them newly re- 
cruited, into order. In his second year of com- 
mand, however, he inflicted a severe defeat on 
Viriathus and compelled him to evacuate the 
Roman territory. 

The war was carried on with varying 
fortunes for four years. In 141 b.c. it seemed 
to have been brought to a conclusion highly 
favourable to the Lusitanians and their gallant 

1 ^Emilius Paullus. This son had been adopted into the 
Fabian family. 



278 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

leaders. Viriathus surprised a Roman army 
that was investing one of the Lusitanian towns, 
and inflicted upon it so heavy a loss that it was 
compelled to raise the siege. In their retreat 
the Romans became entangled in a narrow 
pass, and were compelled to surrender. 
Viriathus was moderate in his demands. 
Lusitania was to be independent, and its 
people recognised as allies and friends of 
Rome. This treaty was ratified at Rome. 
But the ambition of a Roman general and the 
bad faith of the Senate brought this arrange- 
ment to an end. Servilius Caepio was disap 
pointed to find that the war had been brought 
to an end, and obtained permission from the 
Senate, which had not the effrontery to cancel 
the treaty, to make private war upon Viriathus. 
Before long something happened that gave the 
desired pretext, and Viriathus was declared a 
public enemy. He sent envoys to the Roman 
camp to arrange, if it were possible, terms of 
peace. Caepio persuaded them by promises of 
great rewards to murder their chief. This they 
did, stabbing him in the neck as he lay asleep 
in his tent fully armed. The blow was so 
skilfully given that he died without a groan, 
and the murderers were able to escape to the 
Roman camp. From Caepio, however, they 



BEYOND THE PYRENEES 279 

received nothing but the remark that the 
Romans did not approve and could not reward 
soldiers who slew their own general. One is 
glad to record the disappointment of such 
villains, but it is not easy to understand the 
unblushing assurance with which Roman 
historians inveigh against the " Punic faith," 
as they are pleased to call it, of Hannibal. 
The war was carried on for a time, but the 
Lusitanians could find no competent successor 
to Viriathus and were compelled to submit. 

But Spain was not yet subdued. The scene 
of war was transferred to Numantia (now 
Garay on the upper waters of the Douro). 
Though not a walled town, it was a very 
strong place, environed with woods, situated 
on steep cliffs, and protected by two rivers. 
The one accessible side was strongly en- 
trenched. The fighting- force which it could 
muster was small, numbering not more than 
eight thousand, but there were no better 
fighting-men in all Spain. General succeeded 
general in the Roman camp, but no advance 
was made. At last the people of Rome waxed 
impatient. There had been, they said, the 
same disappointment and mismanagement at 
Carthage, and they must employ the same man 
to put an end to them. Scipio Africanus was 



280 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

accordingly elected. He declined to take any 
men from the muster roll. There were soldiers 
enough, he thought, in Spain. And there was 
no lack of volunteers attracted by his remark- 
able prestige, among them a company of five 
hundred to which he gave the name of the 
" Company of Friends." * Even these he left 
to follow him while he hurried on to do for the 
besieging army at Numantia what he had done 
ten years before at Carthage. He cleared 
it of an idle and dissolute multitude, among 
whom soothsayers are specially mentioned, per- 
petually consulted, says the historian, by a 
soldiery demoralised by fear. A spit, a brass 
pot, and a single drinking-cup were all that 
was allowed for mess furniture ; the rations 
were cut down to flesh, boiled or roasted (bread, 
we may presume, though it is not mentioned). 
In short, every luxury was banished, some of 
them seeming, certainly, a little strange, bath 
attendants, for instance. " Your mules," he 
said, " want rubbing down, for they have no 
hands, but you have." This purification 
effected, he proceeded to harden his men by 
exercise, avoiding battle till he thought they 
were fit for it. It is interesting to find that in 

1 Possibly in recollection of the Royal Companions in the 
army of Alexander the Great, vide p. 130. 



BEYOND THE PYRENEES 281 

the winter of this year he was joined by a 
contingent of African troops under the com- 
mand of Jugurtha, a grandson of the old king 
Masinissa. 

The Romans had an overwhelming superiority 
in numbers, and it was only a matter of time 
for a patient and skilful commander such as 
was Scipio to make resistance impossible. The 
river, which the besieged had found very useful 
as a method of communicating with the outer 
world and replenishing their supplies, was 
closed against them by elaborate contrivances. 
The whole town, which had a compass of 
fifteen miles, was closely invested, while a 
system of signals for the protection of the 
siege works from sudden attack was organised. 
Thirty thousand men were on constant duty 
in guarding the turrets and ramparts ; twenty 
thousand more were held in readiness to de- 
liver an assault wherever and whenever Scipio 
might see fit, and there was a further reserve 
of ten thousand. Every man of the whole 
number had his place, which he was not per- 
mitted to leave except under express orders. 
The besieged did not give up the hope of 
damaging the siege works, and made frequent 
attacks, but they contended in vain against a 
system so elaborately complete, one, too, which 



282 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

received the unwearying attention of the man 
who had contrived it. Not a day or a night 
passed, we are told, without Scipio visiting the 
whole circle of the investment. After all, it 
was by the pressure of famine not by superior 
strength that Numantia fell. An embassy was 
sent to ask for terms. Scipio, who knew from 
the deserters how desperate was the condition 
of the city, demanded an unconditional sur- 
render. The unhappy men who carried back 
this unwelcome reply were slain by their 
infuriated countrymen. But there was no 
other alternative, except death. That was the 
choice of the great majority ; a few hundreds 
came out to the conqueror, such a miserable 
spectacle, so squalid, so emaciated, and withal 
so savage as none had ever seen before. 
Scipio chose fifty of the poor wretches to adorn 
his triumph ; the rest he sold as slaves. It 
must be admitted that the Romans were not 
generous enemies, for Scipio was conspicuous 
among his countrymen for humanity and 
culture. Yet this was the best treatment he 
could bring himself to accord to foes so brave 
that he had never ventured an assault on their 
city. 

Sertorius is a remarkable, one might say, an 
admirable figure, but the story of the long 



BEYOND THE PYRENEES 283 

struggle between him and the generals of 
Rome scarcely belongs to my subject. Yet it 
is not wholly unconnected with it. Political 
life at Rome did not habitually run into the 
excesses which were so lamentably common in 
the Greek states. When the aristocrat Corio- 
lanus led the Volscian armies against his own 
country the act was exceptional. Sertorius 
was a democratic Coriolanus. 

Sertorius won considerable distinction as a 
soldier in the campaigns against the Cimbri 
and Teutones. When the Consul Caepio was 
defeated he narrowly escaped with his life, 
swimming across the Rhone in full armour ; 
he fought at Aquae Sextiae, having done good 
service by entering the camp of the Teutones 
as a spy. When the Civil War broke out he 
declared for the democratic party. After 
various changes of fortune the aristocrats were 
victorious, and then Sertorius found himself 
in a most difficult position. The democratic 
leaders had given him a command in Spain, 
as much to get rid of him, for he was too 
honourable to suit them, as for any other 
reason. By degrees he drifted into the position 
of an enemy. He opposed the march of a 
Consular army sent across the Pyrenees by the 
Roman government, crossed to Africa when he 



284 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

could no longer remain in Spain, and came 
back again to take command of the Lusitanians 
when this tribe rebelled against Rome. Here 
he was joined by other adherents of the demo- 
cratic party, the most important of whom was 
a certain Perpenna, who brought with him a 
considerable force, and became his second-in- 
command. All this time, though waging war 
with Roman consuls and proconsuls, he claimed 
to be the Roman governor of Spain, establishing, 
for instance, a Senate into which no one but 
Roman citizens were admitted. In JJ b.c. 
Pompey, who was already famous as a soldier 
— he had enjoyed the honour of a triumph at 
the age of twenty-five — was sent into Spain. 
But Pompey found his task more than he could 
perform. He won, it is true, victories over 
Sertorius' lieutenants, but he could not claim 
any decided success over the great man himself. 
In a great battle fought on the banks of the 
Sucro he was routed with the loss of six 
thousand men. Nor during the three years 
that followed did he make much way. What 
really happened during this time it is not easy 
to say. By some accounts Sertorius became 
self-indulgent and arbitrary ; according to others, 
his Roman colleagues in command, many of 
them of better birth than their superior, were 



BEYOND THE PYRENEES 285 

jealous of him. What is certain is that it was 
by a Roman hand that he fell. In 72 B.C. he 
was assassinated by the orders of Perpenna. 
Perpenna was wholly unequal to the position 
which he hoped to attain by the death of his 
chief. He was defeated in the first battle 
which he fought with the Roman armies, and 
was taken prisoner. To save his life he 
offered to put into Pompey's hands the private 
letters of Sertorius. Many of them had been 
sent from Rome, and would probably have 
compromised various persons of distinction. 
Pompey ordered the letters to be burnt and 
Perpenna to be executed. 

One Spanish people, the Cantabri, represented 
by the modern Basques, still retained their 
independence. They were not finally subdued 
till fifty years after the death of Sertorius, and 
even then they had to be watched and kept in 
order. Spain, however, as a whole became the 
most thoroughly Italian in manners and speech 
of all the provinces of Rome. 



V 



ACROSS EUPHRATES 



IT would be impossible to pass over without 
notice one of the most formidable enemies 
that Rome ever encountered — Mithradates, 
King of Pontus. Mithradates was, indeed, 
hardly to be called a barbarian. He had a 
taste for art and letters, had a museum of 
Greek and Persian antiquities, and played the 
part of a generous patron to poets and philo- 
sophers. But he was a barbarian at heart, 
savage and cruel in his dealings with his kins- 
folk and his servants, and with no conception 
of enlightened rule. Rome, however oppressive 
and short-sighted her individual citizens might 
be, was an agent of civilisation, and her final 
triumph over the King of Pontus, the ablest, it 
may be said, of the Eastern potentates with 
whom she came into connection, was for the 
general good of mankind. 

Mithradates came to the throne of Pontus 



ACROSS EUPHRATES 287 

in early youth. He cherished from the first 
ambitious schemes of extending his dominions. 
At first his efforts were directed against his 
neighbours on the north and east ; when he 
attempted to extend his frontiers westward he 
naturally came into collision with the Romans. 
It is needless to go into details ; it will suffice 
to say that war was declared in b.c. 89. The 
time suited Mithradates very well, for it found 
Rome in a very helpless condition. What is 
called the Social War, i.e., the revolt of the 
Italian allies against Rome, was still in pro- 
gress, and there was positively no army avail- 
able to meet the huge host, nearly 300,000 in 
all, which the King brought into the field. 
All that the Roman officers in Lesser Asia 
could do was to shut themselves up in such 
fortified towns as they could hope to hold 
against the King. Mithradates now gave 
orders for an act which was as foolish as it was 
wicked. He was at Ephesus — the fact shows 
how little remained to Rome — when he directed 
that all Italians sojourning in Lesser Asia 
should be put to death. Had he said 
" Romans," not " Italians," he might have 
secured the combination with himself of the 
Italian adversaries of Rome. As it was he 
hopelessly alienated them. 



288 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

Nor did he make himself better liked by his 
new subjects in Asia. They found that in 
exchanging masters they had lost much more 
than they had gained. The Romans were 
often oppressive, but they had at least some 
kind of system, and were, in theory at least, 
subject to law ; the King was a capricious 
tyrant, whose whims, often as cruel as they 
were strange, had to be instantaneously 
humoured under pain of death or torture. 
The end was that Mithradates was beaten 
everywhere. An army which he had sent 
into Greece was destroyed. His arms were 
equally unsuccessful in Asia. An attempt to 
make common cause with Sulla's political 
opponents — some of the democratic leaders 
were actually in arms — came to nothing. 
Finally, in 84 peace was made. The King 
had to give up all his conquests, to surrender 
for punishments the men who had taken a 
leading part in the massacre, and to pay a war 
indemnity of 20,000 talents. 1 

After a somewhat uneasy peace of ten years 
war broke out again. Each side was suspicious of 
the other. Mithradates had steadily employed 
himself in increasing his dominions in every 
direction where he did not come into actual 
1 Nearly ^5, 000,000, taking the talent at ^240. 



ACROSS EUPHRATES 289 

collision with Rome. Rome, on the other 
hand, had a way of receiving legacies of king- 
doms, very much to the annoyance of those 
who conceived themselves to have a better 
title to the inheritance. In 75 B.C., for 
instance, she took possession of Bithynia, 
which Mithradates had always coveted, in 
accordance with the will of Nicomedes III. 
The King naturally took offence at this pro- 
ceeding, and as he saw at the same time a 
prospect of taking his great enemy at a dis- 
advantage, he declared war. He hoped that 
Sertorius in Spain would make a diversion in 
his favour, and he also looked for help from 
the pirates who swarmed in the Mediterranean. 

These expectations were but partially ful- 
filled. Sertorius was very near the end of his 
career, and could be practically ignored. 
Mithradates won a few successes here and 
there, but he had a very able soldier, Lucullus, 
to contend with. After a few months' fighting 
he had to fly from his kingdom and take 
refuge with his son-in-law, Tigranes, King of 
Armenia. 

Lucullus now ventured on a very bold 
course of action. He sent envoys to Tigranes 
demanding the surrender of Mithradates. This 
was, of course, refused, as indeed Lucullus 

20 



290 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

expected and even intended that it should be. 
The Roman general then crossed the Euphrates 
and marched on Tigranocerta. This was a 
new city, and was the creation as it bore the 
name of Tigranes. He had peopled it with 
inhabitants, taken, after the fashion of Eastern 
kings, from conquered or simply subject tribes, 
and had supplied it with all the conveniences 
and ornaments of Greek civilisation. Its walls, 
the historian tells us, were seventy feet high, 
and must have been of huge circuit, if there 
were parks and lakes within them. Lucullus 
laid siege to the city, though he could hardly 
have had sufficient force to invest it. It was 
not long before Tigranes moved to its relief. 
At first, indeed, he had simply refused to believe 
that the Romans could have made so audacious 
an advance, and with a savagery, in curious 
contrast with his veneer of civilisation, ordered 
the messenger who brought the unwelcome 
news to be crucified. When he learnt the 
truth, he raised a huge army — 250,000 infantry 
and 50,000 cavalry are the numbers given us 
by historians — and marched to attack Lucullus. 
Mithradates was with his son-in-law, and 
strongly advised him not to risk a battle. 
" Use your cavalry to cut off his supplies," 
was his advice, for the old King knew -what 



ACROSS EUPHRATES 291 

Roman soldiers were when they were led by 
such a general as Lucullus. Tigranes laughed 
to scorn this prudent counsel. He could not 
conceive that the handful of men which were 
all that the Romans had to oppose to him, 
could possibly stand up against an army which 
was nearly twenty times as numerous. For 
Lucullus had divided his small force, leaving a 
part to carry on the siege of the city while he 
went to meet Tigranes with the remainder. 1 

The battle that followed was one of the 
most remarkable in history, worthy to be 
ranked with Marathon, for, indeed, the odds 
were at least as great as any of which we have 
a record. Unfortunately for the fame of 
Lucullus there was no one to tell the story as 
it ought to have been told. The strategy of 
Lucullus was that employed times out of 
number with success by the leader of a regular 
army acting against an undisciplined host — he 
outflanked his opponents. What we can under- 
stand from the accounts, not easily reconcilable, 
is that a front attack was made, or rather 
threatened, by the Roman cavalry. It advanced, 

1 "If these men come as ambassadors," Tigranes is 
reported to have said, " there are too many of them ; if they 
are an army there are certainly too few." But he was not 
the first to use the witticism. 



292 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

and then retreated, in seeming panic, and the 
Asiatics pursued in headlong haste. Mean- 
while the outflanking movement had been made 
unseen by the infantry. Attacking the rear of 
the army they sent the camp-followers flying in 
wild confusion ; these broke the lines of the 
infantry ; the infantry in turn threw the horse- 
men into confusion. The panic once set up, 
the huge, unmanageable numbers of the Asiatic 
host did nothing but aggravate it. The pursuit 
was fierce and pitiless. Lucullus threatened 
the severest penalties against any soldier who 
should turn aside for a moment to encumber 
himself with spoil. For fifteen miles the road 
was strewed with costly chains and bracelets 
which no one picked up. The pursuit over, 
the men were allowed to appropriate all the 
treasures they could find. Five Romans, and 
five only, are said to have been slain. The 
enemy's dead were counted by tens of 
thousands. 

This great victory had not, it is true, the 
permanent result which might have been 
expected. This failure was due to the weak- 
ness of the Government at home and the 
jealousy of parties. Lucullus was hampered 
by want of means, and had to share his 
authority with incompetent colleagues. It was 



ACROSS EUPHRATES 293 

not long* before both Tigranes and Mithradates 
recovered all that they had lost. 

But this was but a temporary falling back of 
the Roman power. The people, profoundly 
dissatisfied with the policy that had made such 
brilliant victories unproductive, put the supreme 
power into the hands of a man whom it could 
trust. In 6j b.c. Pompey cleared the Medi- 
terranean of the pirates, and two years later he 
brought to an end the long struggle with 
Mithradates. Tigranes had made his sub- 
mission to Rome, and, while surrendering all 
his conquests, had been permitted to retain his 
hereditary kingdom of Armenia. Mithradates 
was driven to take refuge in a remote region 
at the eastern end of the Black Sea. He had 
conceived, it is said, a bold scheme of raising 
the tribes to the north of that sea and falling- 
upon Italy as the Gauls and as Hannibal had 
fallen upon it. But he had not the means of 
carrying out so large a project. His subjects, 
wearied of perpetual exactions, rebelled, led by 
one of his sons, and he saw that nothing 
remained but death. His wives and his 
daughters were compelled or possibly offered 
to drink poison. He drank it himself, but — so 
runs the story — had so fortified himself with 
antidotes, that the drug did not affect him. 



294 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

He then commanded a Celtic mercenary to 
render him the last service by a stroke of his 
sword. By his death the Roman dominion 
was practically established as far as the 
Euphrates. That it was not to be extended 
beyond it was practically proved by the events 
which I have now to relate. 

Five years after the fall of Mithradates 
there was formed at Rome what is commonly 
called the First Triumvirate. 1 

Of the three men who composed it Pompey 
had gained a great reputation as a soldier, 
Caesar had acquired almost equal distinction 
by his victory in Gaul, while Crassus, though 
he had served with credit on more than one 
occasion, was distinctly inferior in this respect 
to his colleagues. He felt that such an 
inferiority would tell greatly against him when- 
the spoils came to be divided. It was to the 
East that he looked for the opportunity that 
he desired. There had been trouble in the 
region beyond the Euphrates for some time, 
and Rome, accused of having failed to keep 

1 Mommsen speaks of it as the Second, the First being a 
coalition of the same persons ten years before. It is as 
well to remark that the coalition had no legal existence. It 
was an informal agreement between the three most powerful 
citizens to act together. The Second Triumvirate, in 43 B.C., 
was a regularly constituted body. 



ACROSS EUPHRATES 295 

her treaty arrangement, was, of course, mixed 
up in it. In 55 B.C., the year when Caesar's 
command in Gaul had been renewed for a 
second period of five years, Crassus was elected 
Consul, his colleague being Pompey. The 
province allotted to him after his year of 
office was Syria, and he left Rome before the 
year was out to take up his command. He did 
not meet with anything like universal approval. 
The decree which gave him the province of 
Syria made no mention of Parthia, but every- 
one knew that Parthia was to be attacked, and 
there was a strong party that, either from 
prudence or from a sense of right, was strongly 
opposed to what was manifestly a war of 
aggression. One of the Tribunes of the People 
attempted to stop his departure from Rome, 
actually bidding his attendant detain him by 
force. This attempt failing, he took his stand 
at the gate by which Crassus was to depart, 
and on a hastily constructed altar performed 
some mysterious rite by which he devoted, 
under strange and awful curses, the head of 
Crassus to destruction. But Crassus per- 
severed ; arrived at Brundisium he would not 
wait for favourable weather, but at once crossed 
the sea, not without suffering a considerable 
loss in ships. The rest of his journey he 



296 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

performed by land. When passing through 
Galatia he was entertained by the prince of 
that country, Deiotarus, then a very old man. 
Deiotarus was busy building a city, and Crassus 
jestingly marvelled that at such an age he 
should engage in such an undertaking. "And 
you," replied the old man, " who are on your 
way to Parthia, are not quite in your youth." 
Crassus was sixty, and looked, we are told, 
considerably older. 

His first operations, after his arrival, were 
fairly successful, but he did not make a favour- 
able impression. The Euphrates he crossed 
without opposition, and he received the sub- 
mission of some important towns in Mesopo- 
tamia. He was considered, on the other hand, 
to have been wanting in dignity when he 
allowed his soldiers to salute him on the field 
as Imperator after the capture of a third-rate 
fortress — for this was a compliment that was 
appropriate only to real achievements. And 
in his proceedings generally he seemed to look 
to the collection of wealth rather than to 
military glory. The tokens of ill-fortune to 
come were, of course, not wanting. Crassus 
had been joined by his son, who had been 
serving as one of Caesar's lieutenants in Gaul, 
and both paid a visit to a famous temple at 



ACROSS EUPHRATES 297 

Hierapolis. As they were leaving it the son 
caught his foot and fell, and the elder man 
stumbled over him. The enemy were in no 
submissive mood. Envoys from the Parthian 
king declared that if Crassus was executing 
the will of the Roman people the Parthians 
would avenge the insult to the utmost, but that 
if he was only seeking his own private ends 
they would pardon an old man's folly and 
restore unharmed the garrisons who were 
virtually their prisoners. Crassus replied that 
he would give them an answer at Seleucia, 
their capital. " Seleucia ! " cried the leader 
of the embassy, holding up the palm of his 
hand. " Hair will grow on this before you see 
Seleucia." The army soon became seriously 
discouraged. The Parthians were evidently 
a more formidable enemy than they had yet 
encountered, very different from the unwarlike 
races of Western Asia. The reports of the 
soothsayers were of the gloomiest kind, and 
omens of coming disasters were frequent. 
The spot selected for a camp was twice struck 
by lightning ; when the rations were distributed 
the articles first given out were lentils and 
salt, the two chief articles in the meals served 
for the spirits of the dead. Worst of all, the 
eagle-standard of the legion that was the first 



298 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

to advance was seen to turn away from the 
enemy's country. 

Crassus had under his command no con- 
temptible force — seven legions, 4,000 cavalry, 
and an equal number of light-armed troops. 
The first reports that reached him represented 
the enemy as shrinking from the contest. 
This notion was confirmed by an Arab chief, 
Abgarus of Edessa, who was believed to be 
friendly to Rome. He had certainly done 
good service to Pompey, but he was now 
acting in the interest of the Parthian king. 
He urged on Crassus an immediate advance ; 
the enemy, he declared, were already removing 
their most valuable property to a place of 
safety. This was all false. The Parthian 
king with half his army was ravaging Armenia ; 
his commander-in-chief had been detached 
with the other half to deal with Crassus. The 
Romans moved forward with all the haste that 
they could compass. Day after day they 
advanced, but no enemy could be seen. At 
last some horsemen were descried in the dis- 
tance, and Abgarus was sent on in advance 
to reconnoitre. He did not return, and the 
army again moved forwards. Their march 
brought them to a river called the Balissen. 
Crassus was advised by his staff to halt and 






ACROSS EUPHRATES 299 

encamp. He was too impatient to listen to 
this counsel, and still advanced. It was not 
long before he came in sight of the enemy. 
At first sight the Parthian host did not seem 
very formidable. It did not display any of 
the pomp and circumstance of war, and its 
numbers had been carefully concealed. Then 
by a sudden movement the banners of glisten- 
ing silk embroidered with gold were displayed, 
and the helmets and coats of mail glittered in 
the sun, the drums giving out all the time a 
terrific volume of sound. Never before had 
the Romans encountered a similar enemy. It 
was a host of cavalry which they had to meet, 
most of them archers, both man and horse 
being protected with armour made sometimes 
of iron, sometimes of leather. The Romans 
were taken at a terrible disadvantage. All 
their tactics, especially the close order in which 
they were accustomed to fight, told against 
them, whilst their light-armed troops were 
hopelessly outnumbered. The younger Crassus 
was sent forward by his father with a picked 
force, in the hope that he might relieve the 
legions of the brunt of the attack. The enemy 
retreated before him, but when they had lured 
him on out of sight or reach of the main army 
they turned upon him. He had no choice, so 



300 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

overwhelming were their numbers, but to fall 
back before them. He made a stand at a 
hill, on the sloping side of which he ranged 
what troops remained to him. But the ranks 
rising one above another offered a broader 
target to the Parthian archers. Nearly the 
whole force perished, Crassus and his officers 
by their own hands. Five hundred were taken 
prisoners ; none escaped. The first knowledge 
that the elder Crassus had of his son's fate 
was the sight of his head on a pole. The 
attack upon the legions was renewed again 
and again until darkness brought a temporary 
relief. During the night the Romans retreated, 
and reached Carrhae in safety. But even then 
their troubles were not ended. Crassus either 
would not or could not stay at Carrhae, and set 
out in the hope of reaching the friendly country 
of Armenia. He was overtaken, and consented* 
to hold a conference with the Parthian com- 
mander to discuss the terms of an armistice. 
It is not clear whether the Parthians intended 
treachery ; anyhow the Romans suspected it. 
A fierce quarrel ensued ; the Roman officers 
were killed, and Crassus put an end to his 
own life. Of the army many were taken 
prisoners, and a few contrived to escape. But 
as a force it ceased to exist. 




Crass'us defeated by the Parthians. 



ACROSS EUPHRATES 301 

The battle of Carrhae, as it may be called, 
though it happened at some distance from that 
town, was one of the worst disasters in Roman 
history. What especially touched the pride of 
the Empire was the submission of the numerous 
prisoners to their fate. Horace inveighs against 
the cowardice of the men who were content to 
forget all the glorious associations of Rome 
and to become the subjects of a barbarian 
king. He seeks to console himself by telling 
how the standards captured from the army of 
Crassus were torn down from the Parthian 
temples by the victorious Augustus. What 
really happened was that these trophies were 
given up under the conditions of a peace made 
between Parthia and Rome. There was more 
than one struggle between the two powers, and 
the superiority of Roman arms was vindicated 
more than once. Parthia, also, had its 
triumphs. One Roman Emperor, Valerian, 
ended his days in Parthian captivity. When 
the Empire fell in the third century of our era 
it was by a rebellion among its own subjects. 



VI 

THE CONQUESTS OF C/ESAR 

THE second great European conquest 
made by Rome outside the borders of 
Italy was Gaul. The beginning of this con- 
quest, which was spread over about a century, 
the last ten years, however, being by far the 
most productive of result, belongs to the year 
152 B.C. The people of Massilia (Marseilles) 
begged the help of the Romans against two 
tribes of Gaul who were attacking dependencies 
of theirs. Much the same thing happened 
again some twenty years later. The end of 
this and of other affairs which it is not necessary 
to describe in detail was the establishment in 
121 B.C. of what was called the Provincia (a 
name still preserved in the modern Provence). 
Two colonies were founded in this region, one 
at Aquse Sextiae (Aix), the other at Narbo 

Marcius (Narbonne). The Provincia occupied 

302 



THE CONQUESTS OF CAESAR 303 

the valley of the Rhone, and reached westward 
as far as the Garonne. 

I pass on at once to the story of how the 
whole of the country from the Mediterranean 
to the North Sea and from the Atlantic to the 
Rhine was incorporated in the Empire of Rome. 

In 59 B.C. Julius Caesar was appointed to the 
government of Gaul (on both sides of the Alps) 
and Illyria. In the April of the next year he 
proceeded to take up his command. The first 
important operation which he undertook shows 
plainly enough how great a change had taken 
place in the relation between Rome and his 
barbarian neighbours of the north. The 
Helvetii, of whom we have heard in connection 
with the story of the Cimbri and Teutones, 
were in a restless condition. Their land (which 
we may roughly describe as the non-mountainous 
part of Switzerland and adjacent districts of 
France) was too narrow for them, and they 
resolved to look for another more fertile and 
more spacious. A hundred or even fifty years 
before they would certainly have moved south- 
ward, as kindred tribes had done under the 
First and the Second Brennus. But Italy no 
longer tempted them. It was as attractive as 
ever, but the way was too perilous. Accord- 
ingly, the migration of the Helvetii was 



304 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

northward. Caesar saw his opportunity. The 
Helvetii would have to pass through a corner 
of the Provincia, and they sent envoys asking 
his leave. Csesar did not directly refuse their 
request, the truth being that he had not troops 
enough to stop them, if they were minded to 
force a passage. He put them off. He would 
give an answer shortly. When they came 
again his soldiers were ready and therefore 
his answer also. They must not go. The 
Helvetii then chose another way, but Csesar 
is determined that they shall not go at all. 
They went, indeed, burning everything that 
they could not carry with them, but Csesar 
pursued and overtook them. The battle that 
followed was long and fierce. It lasted from 
one o'clock in the afternoon to evening, and 
for all these hours no Roman saw the back 
of a foe. A barricade had been made of the 
waggons, and this was obstinately defended. 
At last the camp was taken, but as many as 
130,000 men made their escape. They had 
three days' start, for Caesar had to stay where 
he was so long, providing for the treatment 
of his wounded, and for the burial of his dead. 
But though the fugitives marched without 
resting day or night they could not get out 
of their enemy's reach. Couriers were sent 



THE CONQUESTS OF CjESAR 305 

on, warning the tribes through whose territories 
they were to pass not to supply the Helvetii 
with food. To do so would be to incur the 
same penalty. This prompt and stern action 
had its immediate effect. The fugitives halted 
and sent back envoys begging for peace. 
Caesar granted their request, but they were to 
give hostages, and to surrender their arms and 
all runaways and deserters. The men of one 
canton attempted to escape eastward, hoping 
that their flight might not be observed till 
it was too late to overtake them. But Caesar 
observed everything ; the unhappy men — there 
were six thousand of them — were brought back 
and slaughtered. The rest were admitted to 
quarter. They were compelled, however, to 
go back to their deserted country. Their 
neighbours, the Allobroges, were instructed to 
feed them till they could grow food for them- 
selves, and they had to build again the houses 
which they had destroyed. Caesar tells the 
story with a passionless accuracy. He shows 
neither anger nor pity. But the bare numbers 
which he gives are eloquent enough. There 
were 368,000 emigrants; 110,000 returned. 
More than two-thirds — men, women, and 
children — had perished. Anyhow, they could 
no longer complain that the land was too 

21 



306 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

narrow for them. But the spirit of unrest had 
reached to other tribes beside the Helvetii. 
The Germans from the eastern side of the 
Rhine had made their way into Gaul, under 
the command of their King Ariovistus. They 
had been invited to come by one tribe of 
Gauls to help them against another, but had 
soon made themselves odious both to friends 
and to foes. The particular tribe which had 
called them in had given up to them one-third 
of its land, and was now called upon to 
surrender another. Caesar was called upon to 
help. The invitation was just what he wanted. 
To be the champion of Gaul was the first step 
towards being its master. Accordingly he 
informed the German kino- that he must let 
the friends of the Roman people alone. 
Ariovistus's answer was a defiance, and Caesar's 
rejoinder was a rapid march eastwards. There 
was no time to be lost. Other tribes from 
beyond the Rhine were said to be on the 
move. Were these to join the first-comers, it 
would be a very formidable combination. 
Seven days' marching brought the Romans 
within twenty-four miles' distance of the enemy. 
There were negotiations which came to nothing, 
various strategic movements, with a cavalry 
skirmish now and then. Finally Caesar made 



THE CONQUESTS OF CAESAR 307 

an attack on the German host, and drove it 
before him to the Rhine. It suffered heavily 
in the flight. Ariovistus escaped, but he took 
very few of his Germans back with him. 

In the following year (57 b.c.) Caesar was 
engaged with the Belgae in North-eastern Gaul. 
(Gaul must always be conceived of as the 
whole country to the westward of the Rhine.) 
He fought and won a great battle on the 
Aisne, falling on the enemy while they were 
endeavouring to cross the river, and inflicting 
a heavy loss on them. " They tried," says 
Caesar, " in the most daring way to pass on 
the dead bodies of their own comrades." As 
he never puts anything in for the sake of 
effect, we may rely on the absolute truth of 
this gruesome picture. This victory was not 
easily won ; a harder piece of work was the 
conflict with the Nervii that shortly followed. 
The Nervii occupied the country now known 
as Belgium, and had a high reputation for 
valour and for simplicity, not to say savagery, 
of life. They would not allow the importation 
of wine or any other foreign luxuries, and they 
were firmly resolved not to have any dealings 
with Caesar. Their kinsmen and neighbours 
who had consented to treat with the Romans, 
had behaved, they considered, with much base- 



3 o8 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

ness and cowardice. The great battle was 
fought on the Sambre, and seems to have 
been, at one time, the most critical thing that 
Caesar was ever engaged in. 

Caesar had been marching with his legions — 
he had eight in his force — each followed by 
its own baggage, and so far, therefore, 
separated from each other. The Nervii had 
been informed of this arrangement by some 
well-wishers in Caesar's train, and had been 
advised to deliver their attack on the foremost 
legion as soon as the baggage came in sight. 
But the Roman general, who probably knew 
this, as great commanders have a way of 
knowing everything, altered his order on the 
way. First came the cavalry, then six legions 
together, all in light marching order, then the 
baggage, and bringing up the rear two newly 
levied legions. When the baggage came in 
sight the Nervii saw, as they thought, their 
opportunity. As a matter of fact, they had 
been waiting too long. They had to deal 
with six legions, not, as they expected, with 
one. Even then their onslaught came perilously 
near to a success. Emerging unexpectedly 
from the woods in which they had been lying 
hid, they drove before the Roman cavalry, and 
were engaged in hand-to-hand fight with the 






THE CONQUESTS OF CJESAR 309 

legions almost before these knew what had 
happened. It was almost a surprise. " Caesar," 
so he writes of himself, "had everything to 
do at once — to hoist the red flag that was 
the signal for battle, give the trumpet call, 
summon back to their places in the ranks 
the men who were collecting materials for the 
rampart, draw up the line, and address the 
troops." The enemy had been unexpectedly 
quick in their attack. On the other hand, 
the army was in thoroughly good order ; every 
man knew what he had to do. But the time 
was very short. The men could not even don 
their helmets or get their shields out of their 
covers before the enemy was upon them. The 
tribesmen in alliance with the Nervii could not 
hold their own against the Romans, but the 
Nervii themselves for a time carried everything 
before them, breaking through the two legions 
that confronted them, and actually taking 
possession of the Roman camp. The camp 
followers fled in dismay, and were followed by 
some of the light-armed troops. Even a con- 
tingent of cavalry sent by the Treveri rode 
off the field, and carried with them the report 
that the day was lost. As the Treveri had 
a high reputation for courage, their flight was 
of the very worst omen. 



310 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

At this critical moment Caesar personally 
intervened, and restored the fortunes of the 
day. He seized a shield, addressed himself to 
the centurions, whose names, again after the 
fashion of the great general, he knew, and 
turned the tide of battle. Caesar did not 
show himself so frequently in the front as 
was the habit of Alexander, but he could do 
it on occasion with the happiest effect. At 
the same time the officer in command of the 
tenth legion (Caesar's corps d^lite, as we may 
call it), who had made a successful attack on 
the enemy's position, brought back that force 
to the help of his chief. The Nervii still 
resisted with the greatest courage. But the 
day was lost, and few of the tribe, so far, at 
least, as it had taken part in the battle, were 
left alive. An episode of the campaign is 
worth relating, though it had little or no effect 
on the general result. The force left by the 
Cimbri and Teutones to guard their spoil had 
after various wanderings found their way into 
this region. They asked and obtained terms 
from Caesar, tried to outwit, and were, by way 
of punishment, sold as slaves. 

The third campaign was carried on in 
Western Gaul, among the Veneti, represented 
by the Bretons of to-day. Caesar had made a 



THE CONQUESTS OF CMSAR 311 

requisition on them for corn, of which, as they 
were a seafaring people, they had probably 
little to spare. They refused the demand, 
which, indeed, he had no right but that of 
superior force to make, and even detained 
his envoys, whom they probably considered, 
and not without good reason, to be spies. 
Caesar found that he wanted ships if he 
were to deal successfully with the Veneti. 
Accordingly he had a fleet built on the 
Loire, and manned with a levy raised in the 
neighbourhood. It was the First Punic War 
over again. The tribes of the western coast 
were beaten on their own element. As they 
had been guilty of what Caesar chose to con- 
sider a great offence, an insult to ambassadors, 
he determined to punish them with unusual 
severity. Their chiefs were put to death ; 
the rest of the population sold into slavery. 
A general surrender of the western tribes 
took place. Meanwhile one of the great 
man's lieutenants subdued the region between 
the Pyrenees and the Garonne (to the west, 
therefore, of the Provincia), and Caesar him- 
self spent what remained of the year in 
reducing some tribes in the north-east. 

In the following year (b.c. 55) Northern Gaul 
was disturbed by another great movement of 



312 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

population. Two German tribes, themselves dis- 
possessed by the overpowering strength of the 
Suebi, a great confederation of kindred tribes 
from Eastern Germany, crossed the Rhine, 
and quartered themselves on the Menapii, a 
people which inhabited the left bank of the 
lower Rhine. Caesar was well aware that the 
ill-affected Gauls would soon make common 
cause with the new-comers, and determined to 
be beforehand with his enemies of either race. 
He marched with great promptitude against 
them, not allowing himself to be put off by the 
negotiations which they desired or pretended 
to open with him. Before long a treacherous 
attack, made by the German horsemen on 
Caesar's cavalry — chiefly composed, it would 
seem, of native levies — gave him an excellent 
justification for acting. He attacked the enemy, 
and drove them in headlong flight to the river. 
Many were slain in the fight and the pursuit, 
more were drowned in the river ; the result was 
the almost entire destruction of the invading 
host. Nor did this satisfy him. He deter- 
mined to make a demonstration of his strength 
in Germany itself. To do this he had to 
transport his army across the Rhine. To 
carry them over in boats did not, as he puts 
it, suit the dignity of the Roman people. 



THE CONQUESTS OF CAESAR 313 

Possibly he thought it unsafe. Accordingly 
he built a bridge, a marvel of engineering 
skill, when we consider the breadth, depth, and 
force of the river to be spanned, and the short 
supply of tools and materials at hand. The 
work was complete in ten days ; eighteen days 
more were spent in Germany. And Caesar 
then came back, having certainly impressed the 
tribes beyond the Rhine with a great idea of 
his resources. Late in this year Caesar made 
his first expedition to Britain. Of this and of 
the more serious invasion of the following year 
I shall have to speak elsewhere. 

The year 54 B.C. was a very critical time. 
Caesar evidently had overrated the result of 
his successes, a pardonable error, so rapid and 
apparently so complete had they been. A 
feeling of false security had suggested the 
somewhat romantic expedition to Britain, an 
expedition which he certainly would not have 
made if he had been aware of the real state of 
affairs in Gaul. He supposed that the country 
had been finally subdued—" pacified " or 
"quieted" was the Roman euphemism — but 
he was rudely undeceived. Fortunately for 
him he was in Gaul when the formidable rising, 
which he had soon to crush, took place. If he 
had been still in Britain, or if, as had been his 



314 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

intention, he had started for the south, the 
consequences might have been more serious 
than they were. 

The harvest in Gaul that year (b.c. 54) had 
been short. Hence it became necessary to 
scatter the legions in arranging for their winter 
quarters. There were eight legions, and the 
half of another, and they were located in eight 
camps. Two of these camps were in Nor- 
mandy (Seez and Chartres), two in Picardy 
(Amiens and Montdidier), one in Artois (St. 
Pol), and three in Belgium (Charleroi, Tongres, 
and Lavacherie on the Ourthe). One of the 
last three, that at Tongres, which was under 
the command of two legates, Sabinus and 
Cotta, was attacked by a detachment from one 
of the tribes in the neighbourhood. Force not 
succeeding, treachery was tried. One of the 
local chiefs, Ambiorix by name, proposed a 
conference. He was friendly, he said, to the 
Romans, Caesar having done him a kindness, 
though he had been compelled to pose as an 
enemy. His advice to the generals was to 
leave the camp, which it would not be possible 
to hold. A multitude of Germans had crossed 
the Rhine, and were on their way to attack the 
camp. If the troops were withdrawn to one of 
the other camps in Eastern Gaul, he would 



THE CONQUESTS OF CAESAR 315 

guarantee them a safe-conduct. The two 
officers in command were divided in opinion. 
Finally Sabinus, who was in favour of evacuating 
the camp, had his way. At dawn next day 
they started ; after proceeding two miles they 
fell into an ambush. Forming into a circle 
they resisted, till the severity of their losses 
made them ask for terms. These were granted, 
and immediately broken. Sabinus and some 
officers laid down their arms and were 
massacred ; Cotta died fighting ; the survivors 
of the day's battle made their way back into 
the camp. Seeing that they could not possibly 
hold it against the enemy, they committed 
suicide during the night. A few stragglers 
escaped to the camp at Lavacherie, where 
Labienus was in command. 

The camp at Charleroi, in the country of the 
Nervii, where Q. Cicero, younger brother of the 
great orator, was in command, was next attacked. 
The Gauls, now largely increased in number, 
assaulted it with the greatest fury, but were 
repulsed. Caesar was informed of the position 
of affairs, and acted with his usual promptitude. 
He was able to concentrate a force of two 
legions, and with these he promptly relieved 
Cicero, having inflicted a severe defeat on a 
force of Gauls which attacked him on the way. 



316 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

The next year (53 B.C.) was entirely devoted 
to exacting vengeance for the massacre of 
Sabinus and Cotta with their men. It is need- 
less to follow the operations of Caesar. It 
must suffice to say that though one somewhat 
serious reverse was sustained, they were success- 
ful on the whole. But much yet remained to 
be done before Gaul could be said to have 
been thoroughly " pacified." Caesar was yet to 
be reduced to greater straits than he had yet 
experienced. 

The year 52 b.c. was one of furious party 
strife in Rome, and Caesar gives us clearly to 
understand that this state of things had its 
effect on the Gauls. Chafing under the newly 
imposed yoke, they naturally exaggerated the 
troubles of their masters. In one matter in 
particular, their " wish was father to their 
thought." They dreaded, and with excellent 
reason, the commanding personality of Caesar. 
He had done in seven years more than his 
predecessors had been able to accomplish in 
seventy. What an inestimable advantage it 
would be if he were to be kept away from the 
scene of war by these party quarrels ! The 
report that this was the case was spread about 
and eagerly believed. In a very short time all 
Gaul was in a blaze of revolt, the news spread- 



THE CONQUESTS OF CAESAR 317 

ing with extraordinary rapidity. What had 
happened at Gennabum (Orleans) at sunrise 
was known in the country of the Auverni, 
nearly 150 miles away, before 9 p.m. It was 
shouted from field to field. 

Vercingetorix, an Auvernian, was the hero of 
the new movement. All the tribes of Western 
Gaul joined him immediately. He began his 
own operations in the south-west on the borders 
of the old Provincia. While occupied with 
them, Caesar suddenly appeared on the scene, 
bringing with him new levies from the other 
side of the Alps. His coming caused an 
immediate change in the aspect of affairs. 
Moving with his usual speed, he concentrated 
his army at Sens (80 miles to the south-east of 
Paris). He then proceeded to attack one after 
another of the revolting tribes. His successes 
were so numerous and so rapid that Vercingetorix 
felt that he must change his plan of campaign. 
Unable to meet Caesar in the field, he must 
starve him out. To do this it was necessary to 
lay the whole country waste. Even the towns 
would have to be burnt. Only the policy, to be 
useful, had to be thorough. This was more 
than Vercingetorix could effect. When it came 
to the question of destroying Avaricum 
(Bourges) he had to give way. Its inhabitants 



3 i8 



ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 



pleaded for it too earnestly, for it was the finest 
city in Gaul. If it had been burnt with all the 
stores that it contained the Roman campaign 
must have ended in disaster. As it was, the 
town was besieged by Caesar. The Gallic 
chief, who had his camp sixteen miles away, 
did all he could to annoy and injure the 
besiegers. But he could not stop them. He 
threw 10,000 men into the city, but though the 
defence was prolonged, the skill and determina- 
tion of the Romans would not be denied. When 
the prospect seemed desperate the garrison 
resolved to leave the city, but the shrieks of 
the women revealed their intention to the 
besiegers. Finally Avaricum was stormed, 
and all its inhabitants massacred. 

Great as was this disaster, Vercingetorix felt 
his position to be strengthened by it. He 
could now say to his countrymen, " Avaricum 
has perished, after all, but the Romans have 
got the stores." Caesar's next proceeding was 
to lay siege to Gergovia, a town which cannot 
be identified. Here he met with a decided 
reverse. One division of his army persisted 
in an attack upon the walls after the recall had 
been sounded, and were repulsed with heavy 
loss, yoo men, of whom nearly fifty were 
officers, falling in the action. Caesar himself 



THE CONQUESTS OF CAESAR 319 

seems to have had a narrow escape. He does 
not mention it himself, not thinking, perhaps, 
that it was of sufficient importance to be 
recorded. But Servius, an ancient commen- 
tator on Virgil, relates it on the authority of 
a Diary {Ephemeris) which was extant in his 
time. In Virgil, Tarchon, an Etrurian chief 
and ally of ^Eneas, drags one Venulus, in full 
armour, from off his horse. The same thing, 
he says, happened to Csesar at Gergovia. One 
of the Gauls recognised him as he was being 
carried away, and shouted out Ccesar ! The 
name was very like the Gallic words for " Let 
him go ! " And Csesar's captor relaxing his 
hold, the great man escaped. Plutarch tells 
another story of how the Auverni had a sword 
hanging up in one of their temples which they 
declared to be Caesar's, and that when it was 
shown to him, he smiled. Nor was the defeat 
at Gergovia the last of his troubles. The ^Edui, 
who had been loyal to Rome from the be- 
ginning, now joined the rebellion. They seized 
Csesar's depot at Noviodunum (site unknown), 
slaughtered the garrison, and possessed them- 
selves of the stores, and with them, of the 
hostages, who were pledges of the fidelity of 
the other tribes. They then tried to stop him 
from crossing the Loire. As usual, he was too 



3 20 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

quick for them. His legions forded the river, 
though the river, swollen with the melted snows, 
was breast-high. 

Labienus, who was operating in the neigh- 
bourhood of Paris, had had difficulties of his own, 
but had surmounted them with his usual skill. 
He was Caesar's ablest lieutenant, as useful to 
his chief as Lord Hill was to Wellington in the 
Peninsula. He now succeeded in joining the 
main army. Notwithstanding this addition of 
strength, the Roman commander was compelled 
to retreat. He was not far from the Provincia 
when he turned upon Vercingetorix and de- 
feated him, largely by the help of the German 
cavalry. The Romans, among other qualifi- 
cations of a ruling race, had the gift of turning 
to the best account the qualities of others. 
Eight or nine years before there was not a 
trooper of German race in the Roman army; 
now that nation furnishes it with an efficient 
arm. 

Vercingetorix now threw himself into Alesia, 
a strong place in the hills, probably to be 
identified with Alise-Sainte-Reine in Burgundy. 
He sent messengers to the various States in 
alliance, asking for a lev^e-en-masse. This was 
not made, but a huge army was gathered, 
250,000 infantry and 8,000 horse. It was the 



THE CONQUESTS OF CMSAR 321 

last great effort of Gaul for freedom, and it 
failed. The Gauls came on, convinced that 
they must triumph, but the Romans stood firm 
during a struggle that lasted from noon till 
sunset, and the enemy were driven back to 
their camp. Another attack, made after a brief 
rest, failed also. Then came the last desperate 
struggle. One of the chiefs of the relieving 
army, a kinsman of Vercingetorix, threw him- 
self on a weak spot in the lines of investment, 
where the Roman camp had been constructed 
on ground that sloped towards the town. He 
had 60,000 men with him ; the Roman force 
consisted of two legions. The besieged made 
a simultaneous effort to break out. The 
struggle was long and fierce. Caesar directed 
the Roman battle from a point of advantage. 
When the time came, he himself, conspicuous 
in the scarlet cloak of command, took personal 
part in the struggle. His trusted lieutenant 
Labienus got together forty cohorts from all 
parts of the lines of investment, and Caesar put 
himself at their head. The Gallic host was 
utterly broken. The slaughter on the field was 
great, and the survivors dispersed during the 
night that followed, every man seeking his 
native State. The next day Vercingetorix 
surrendered himself to the conqueror. He was 

22 



322 



ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 



kept in prison for seven years, was led in the 
triumph which Caesar celebrated in 45 B.C. and 
put to death afterwards. The war in Gaul 
lasted for two years more. One after another 
the rebellious States were subdued, and dealt 
with mercifully or severely as policy dictated. 
Caesar, who recognised the duty, or, any- 
how, the policy, of forgiveness where his 
countrymen were concerned, was wholly proof 
against any emotion of the kind when he had 
to do with barbarians. He had no pleasure in 
a massacre ; but, on the other hand, it caused 
him no compunction or even pain. These eight 
years of war must have cost Gaul some two 
millions of lives. It was an awful price to pay, 
but it completed a great work, which had been 
on hand for three centuries and a half. In 
390 b.c. Brennus captured Rome ; in 50 b.c. 
the Gauls had become the Latin people which 
they are to-day. 



VII 

FURTHEST BRITAIN. 

I CAN NOT omit all mention of our own 
island, though it can hardly be said that 
there was any incident in its history of 
really critical importance in the long struggle 
between Rome and the barbarian tribes. 

The visits of Csesar to Britain, though highly 
interesting in more ways than one, may be 
briefly passed over. He came for the first 
time not long before the end of the cam- 
paigning season in 55 B.C. His chief reason, 
as he states it himself, was that he found that 
the Britons were in the habit of helping their 
neighbours of Gaul. (The inhabitants of south- 
eastern England were of the same race as the 
Belgse.) We do not find, as a matter of fact, 
any mention of British auxiliaries in the Gallic 
armies, or that in later years Gaul was tempted 

into rebellion by the knowledge that Britain 

323 



324 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

was free. Caesar was of the Alexander type, 
strongly moved by the ambition of a conqueror. 
The first visit lasted altogether about three 
weeks, and the army practically remained where 
it landed. 

The second visit took place in the following 
year (54 B.C.) and was a far more important 
affair. Caesar's intention was, we may be sure, 
to conquer the island. Probably he was not 
acquainted with its real dimensions, and cir- 
cumstances occurred that made him change his 
plans. Originally, however, he had in his 
mind something more than a reconnaisance 
en force. He brought with him six legions 
and 2,000 cavalry, more than a half of his 
whole available force, coming at the end of 
July, and leaving about the middle of Sep- 
tember. He advanced some sixty or seventy 
miles into the country, crossing the Thames, 
possibly near Weybridge, possibly a little below 
Eton. The Britons could not, of course, stand 
against him in the field, but they proved them- 
selves to be formidable enemies. Caesar does 
not expressly say that he had underrated the 
difficulties of the task ; but he acted as if he 
had. He was engaged in Gaul for five more 
years, and during the last two of these five was 
practically master of the country, but he seems 



FURTHEST BRITAIN 325 

to have entirely abandoned the idea of sub- 
jugating Britain. 

For 89 years the island was left practically 
to itself. Augustus, in the scroll of his achieve- 
ments which he inscribed on a slab in a temple 
at Ancyra (the capital of the Roman province 
of Galatia) mentions the tribute paid by certain 
British kings; the inscription is imperfect at this 
place, and we know no particulars. It is certain, 
however, that no serious attempt was made on 
Britain between the years 54 B.C. and 43 a.d. 
There are various allusions to the people in the 
literature of the time, but they are always 
spoken of as savage enemies of whom very 
little was known. 

In 43 a.d., however, Rome, at the invitation 
of a native prince, who conceived himself to 
have suffered wrong, seriously undertook the 
conquest of the Island. Aulus Plautius was 
appointed to the command, took four legions 
with him, and in the course of the year the 
Emperor himself (Claudius) brought over an 
additional force. A great battle was fought 
near Camalodunum (Colchester), in which the 
Britons were, as usual, defeated. Vespasian, 
afterwards Emperor, was actively engaged in 
the west of the Island. We know very little 
of the details of the campaigns which followed. 



326 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

One heroic figure, however, stands prominently 
out. This is Caractacus (Caradoc). For seven 
years this prince (elder son of Cunobelin, the 
Cymbeline of Shakespeare) held out against the 
Roman forces. We cannot identify the scene 
of the final battle, 1 but a sufficiently clear 
description of it has been preserved. The 
Britons occupied a hill which had an un- 
fordable river in front, and was itself fortified, 
wherever the ground permitted or required it, 
with ramparts of stones. So formidable did 
the position, crowded as it was with warriors, 
seem to the Roman general, that he was in- 
clined to manoeuvre, probably to attempt a 
flanking movement. But the soldiers demanded 
to be led to a frontal attack, and their general 
yielded. The river was crossed, how we are 
not told. The space between the river and 
the British ramparts was not traversed without 
loss. Many were wounded and some killed by 
a storm of missiles from the British lines. But 
when the teshido was formed under the ram- 
part, rudely constructed of uncemented stones, 
the battle was practically over. The rampart 
was soon pulled down, and the Britons retired 
to the heights. Here they were outmatched. 

1 It was probably somewhere in Shropshire or Hereford- 
shire. 



FURTHEST BRITAIN 327 

The artillery played upon them from a distance, 
and they had nothing wherewith to reply to it. 
In close combat the armour and weapons of 
the legions gave them an immense advantage. 
Finally the Britons were driven headlong from 
their position. Caractacus' wife and daughter 
were captured, and his brothers surrendered 
themselves. The king himself was handed 
over to his enemies by the treachery of a 
neighbouring potentate, Queen Cartismandua. 
The story of his dignified behaviour before 
Claudius, and of the generous spirit with which 
it was taken, need not be repeated here. 
Roman manners had been somewhat softened 
since the days when the brave Vercingetorix 
had been put to death. It was not that 
Caractacus had ceased to be formidable ; he 
was never allowed to return to Britain. 

Nor need I tell in detail the story of the 
revolt of Boadicea, Queen of the Iceni, a tribe 
of Eastern Britain. It was provoked by the 
insolence of Roman officials and the greed of 
Roman financiers, 1 and for a time it shook 

1 According to Dion, the philosopher Seneca had some- 
thing to do with the disturbance by suddenly calling in 
money which he had lent at usurious interest. We may 
hope that it is a slander, but Romans of good repute were 
not above such conduct. The patriotic Brutus lent money 



328 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

the Roman power in Britain to its base. 
Londinium, already the largest and wealthiest 
town in Britain, though not ranking as a 
colony, was sacked ; so was Verulamium (St. 
Alban's) and other places. As many as seventy 
thousand persons are said to have perished. 
The majority must have been Britons, 
"friendly natives," as we should now call 
them ; but there were many Italians among 
them. " Citizens and allies " is the historian's 
term. As only seventeen years had passed 
since the conquest of Britain had commenced, 
it is remarkable how far the Romanising of the 
country had proceeded. Traders and settlers 
must have swarmed into it, as they do in the 
United States when an Indian reserve is 
thrown open. Besides these frightful mas- 
sacres, there were military disasters. One 
legion was cut to pieces. The commander 
of another was so cowed that he did not 
venture out of his camp. But Paullinus, the 
commander-in-chief, behaved with consummate 
discretion. He refused to risk a battle with 
insufficient forces, though his delay meant the 
destruction of London. But when he struck 

to a town in Cyprus at 40 per cent., and was much annoyed 
with Cicero for refusing the help of the military in collecting 
the debt. 



FURTHEST BRITAIN 329 

he struck with terrific force. The British army 
was practically annihilated. In Southern 
Britain, at least, the dominion of Rome was 
never seriously threatened for many years after 
the great victory won by Paullinus. 

When, in a.d. j8, Agricola took over the 
command of Britain, it was in North Wales 
that he carried on his first campaign. The 
campaigns that followed I need not describe 
in detail. The last of them was finished by 
a great victory over the Caledonians near the 
Grampians, probably at Aberfoyle, in Perth- 
shire. The Roman sway, however, did not 
really extend so far. Its high- water mark 
was, probably, reached about a.d. 200, when 
the Emperor Septimius Severus marched to 
the extreme north of the Island, and on his 
return added a second wall to the great 
rampart constructed by Antoninus Pius be- 
tween the estuaries of the Forth and the 
Clyde. But this advanced post was not long 
held. The most permanent, as it was the 
most elaborate barrier against the northern 
tribes, was the Great Wall built by Hadrian, 
about a.d. 120, between the Solway Firth 
and Newcastle-on-Tyne. Britain south of 
this was completely Latinised. But the ex- 
istence of the walls and the fact that the 



330 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

Island had the reputation of being to the 
Empire what India is to us, a nursery of 
captains, prove that the North was practi- 
cally independent. Here then — and this is 
what makes Britain really important in 
Roman history — was the furthest limit of 
Roman advance. And it was here that the 
first overt confession of weakness had to be 
made. In a.d. 408 one of the many soldiers 
of fortune who attempted to seize the 
Imperial throne crossed over into Gaul 
with the British legions. The legions never 
came back, and Britain, though nominally 
included in the Provinces of the Empire, was 
actually abandoned. 



VIII 



BEYOND THE RHINE 



IN the German tribes Rome found at last 
the antagonist who was to vanquish her. 
The victories of Marius and of Caesar had 
been complete, but they did not crush the 
race. Their numbers and the solidity of their 
character, moulded as it was by a tenacity 
and a power of resistance which neither the 
Spaniard nor the Gaul had shown, made 
them practically unconquerable. The early 
Empire was not without ambitions in this 
direction. Drusus, the step-son of Augustus, 
carried on several campaigns in Lower 
Germany, and executed besides some im- 
portant engineering works, in the way of 
canals and embankments, which were intended 
to make the country more accessible. But he 
came, once at least, very near to a terrible 
disaster. In B.C. 1 1 he had got as far as the 



331 



332 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

Weser, thanks, in part at least, to the absence 
of his most formidable enemies, the Sicambri, 
who were busy fighting with the Chatti. At 
the Weser he felt that it would be prudent to 
halt and to retrace his steps. It was well that 
he did, for the Sicambri had settled their 
quarrel with their neighbours, and were now 
in the opposite ranks. At a place called 
Arbalo, which we have no means of locating, 
he was almost surrounded. The allied tribes 
threw away, by their rashness, a victory which 
was almost in their hands. They divided, so to 
speak, the Roman wolfskin before they had cap- 
tured the wolf. Each tribe chose its own share 
of the spoil, rushed in a headlong charge to 
secure it, and were driven back with heavy loss, 
Drusus built two forts which might be convenient 
centres for future operations, and returned to 
Rome, where he had so much of the honours 
of a triumph as the jealousy of the Emperor 
permitted a subject to enjoy. In the following 
year (b.c. io) he returned to the same country, 
and in b.c. 9 he did the very same thing again, 
It was in this campaign that he reached his 
furthest point, making his way as far as the 
Elbe itself. Here indeed — so it seemed to the 
men of the time — was the fate-appointed limit 
of the Roman arms. As he was making ready 



BEYOND THE RHINE 333 

to cross the Elbe, a female figure, of more 
than human proportions, appeared to him. 
"Whither goest thou, insatiable Drusus ? " 
cried the strange apparition. " Destiny forbids 
thee to go further. Here is the end of thy 
exploits and thy life." He erected trophies 
on the river bank to mark the spot which he 
had reached, and turned back. But he never 
reached the Rhine. He was thrown from his 
horse, and received injuries from which he 
died. His younger brother Tiberius arrived 
just in time to see him alive. The last duties 
to the dead performed — Tiberius is said to 
have walked before the bier all the way from 
the Rhine bank to Rome — he returned to 
prosecute the campaign. For some years the 
Roman arms met no serious check, and by 
a.d. 9 so much had been done in subjugating 
the country that Augustus conceived the idea 
of making it into a Roman province. For this 
purpose he sent an officer of high rank, who 
had for some years administered the province 
of Syria — Quintilius Varus. The new-comer 
was totally mistaken about the real condition 
of the country, which was on the brink of 
revolt. The native chiefs, at whose head was 
the famous Arminius (the Latin form of 
Hemann), pretended friendship and submis- 



334 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

sion, assisting at the courts which he held 
after the fashion of an Indian durbah, and 
promptly executing his orders. The report 
of an insurrection in South Germany reached 
him while thus employed, and he marched 
southward to quell it. Arminius and his 
fellow-countrymen left him, under a promise 
to return, but really with the intention of 
preparing an attack. His road lay through 
the valleys of what is now called the 
Teutoburgerwald Wald, between Osnabruck 
and Paderborn, in Westphalia. He marched 
without any suspicion of danger, his army in 
a straggling line, encumbered with baggage 
and a multitude of non-combatants. Half-way 
through the pass they were attacked. There 
were three legions and a considerable force 
of cavalry, and for a time they successfully 
resisted the enemy. The camp which they 
pitched at the end of the first day's battle 
was of such a size, when it was discovered 
some years afterwards, as to show that the 
three legions were then substantially intact. 
The next day, after destroying his baggage, 
for he recognised that his position was one of 
extreme peril and that his only hope was to 
give to his army all the mobility possible, he 
made for the fortress of Aliso on the Lippe. 



BEYOND THE RHINE 335 

All the day he was attacked, and had to 
struggle for every yard of road. By evening 
his forces had been greatly diminished, for 
the second camp was seen to be much 
smaller than the first. The third day's 
march brought them out of the woods, but 
only to encounter a fresh multitude of the 
enemy. Their strength was now exhausted, 
and they could no longer keep their ranks. 
Varus killed himself; his army, a very few 
excepted who contrived to reach Aliso, was 
destroyed. The effect in Germany was to 
throw back the frontier of Rome to the 
Rhine ; in Rome the news produced some- 
thing like a panic. The disaster embittered 
the remaining years of Augustus. Again and 
again he was known to start from his sleep 
and cry in tones of agony, " Quintilius Varus, 
give me back my legions ! " 

Rome could not, of course, submit to such a 
defeat without vindicating her honour. This 
was not an easy task. In a.d. 14, Germanicus, 
the son of Drusus, marched into the country 
with a powerful force. He narrowly escaped 
disaster. Had not the divisions between the 
German chiefs hindered them from following 
up their successes — both Germanicus and his 
lieutenant, Csecina, suffered serious reverses — 



336 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

he might have met with the fate of Varus. In 
the campaign of 1 6 he was more fortunate, and, 
if the Roman narratives are not exaggerated, 
restored the old frontiers. Arminius himself 
was nearly taken, and Northern Germany, 
between the Rhine and the Elbe, was once 
again Roman. But Tiberius did not like a 
" forward " policy. Tacitus, who abhorred the 
man, tells us that his motive was a mean 
jealousy of Germanicus, but it is likely that he 
saw that the resources of the Empire might be 
better expended. Anyhow, Germanicus was 
recalled, and Germany recovered her freedom ; 
nor was any serious attempt again made, as far 
as the northern part of the country was con- 
cerned, to reassert the authority of Rome. It 
was to the south that Rome limited her efforts 
for dominion. 



IX 



THE LAST ADVANCE 



WHEN Tacitus speaks of the urgentia 
imperii fata, the irresistible destinies 
of empire, he uses a phrase which every 
Englishmen understands. A great empire 
cannot stand still. Its adventurous subjects 
are always pressing forward, and must be pro- 
tected. Its neighbours are continually feeling 
and resenting the pressure which it exercises 
upon them. It has to defend boundaries which 
represent to those who are outside them a 
series of aggressions, and it has to satisfy the 
warlike tastes of the huge force which it has to 
keep under arms. Augustus had done his best 
to limit the growth of the Empire. His testa- 
ment to his successors was an injunction, it 
would be better, perhaps, to say a counsel, that 
no new dominions should be sought. Tiberius 

religiously observed this advice. But the 

23 337 



338 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

Csesars that followed Tiberius found the circum- 
stances of the situation too much for them. 
Caligula made an expedition against the nations 
yet unsubdued beyond the northern frontier, 
which might have been serious but for his own 
lunatic folly. Claudius began the subjugation 
of Britain, which was carried to a conclusion 
by the brilliant generalship of Agricola in the 
reign of Domitian. Domitian was not so fortu- 
nate in his other great enterprise. This was 
the invasion of Dacia. Agricola was still alive, 
but Domitian was too jealous of his abilities 
and his renown to entrust to him the manage- 
ment of the campaign. He found a substitute 
in the person of Cornelius Fuscus, Prefect of 
the Praetorians, who had at least the recom- 
mendation of being a subservient courtier. 
Juvenal includes Fuscus among the counsellors 
who were summoned to discuss the important 
question of how the gigantic turbot which a 
fisherman had presented to the Emperor 
should be cooked. He seems to have been a 
student of the military art, for he is described 
as "planning battles in his marble halls." 
Possibly he wrote a book on the subject. In the 
field he seems to have had little or no capacity. 
The Dacian chief, Decebalus by name, enticed 
the Roman general to cross the Danube, turned 



THE LAST ADVANCE 339 

on him when the opportunity came, and 
defeated him with the loss of at least one 
legion and its exile. We have absolutely no 
record of the battle. It came within the period 
of events covered by the histories of Tacitus, 
but the book which contained the narrative 
is lost. Even did we possess it, we should 
still be ignorant of one important detail, for 
Orosius, who had the narrative before him, 
tells us that Tacitus held it to be the part of a 
good citizen to conceal the losses suffered by 
the armies of Rome. The whole story is 
wrapped in obscurity. It is said that the 
defeat of Fuscus was retrieved in the next 
campaign by his successor Julianus. But 
again we have no details. There is even to be 
found the statement, whether well or ill-founded 
we cannot say, that the Dacians exacted from 
Rome an annual sum of money as the price of 
their forbearance. 

It was to Dacia then that Trajan turned his 
thoughts when he found himself seated on the 
imperial throne. Trajan had many reasons for 
undertaking the enterprise. It was much to 
his taste. He was a soldier, who had already 
distinguished himself in the field. And he had 
to justify his elevation to the throne. The 
Empire really rested on the swords of the 



340 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

soldiers, and no man who could not count on 
the respect of the army could feel himself safe. 
And there was also the cogent reason that it 
was easier to attack than to defend, that the 
barbarians, if left to themselves, would sooner 
or later invade the Empire, and that the wisest 
plan would be to assume the offensive, 

Trajan was busied with protecting the 
German frontier of the Empire when he 
received the news that he had been adopted by 
the aged Nerva. He spent a year, after receiv- 
ing the tidings, in completing the preparation 
for its defence. Then he went to take up his 
new dignity. Home affairs settled, he started 
for the Danube. Of the campaigns which 
followed we know little in one way, and much 
in another. We know, from the sculptures 
on Trajan's Column, exactly what arms and 
armour, and what engines of war were used by 
the soldiers of Rome. But as to the strategy 
of the campaign, and its chief incidents, we are 
almost wholly in the dark. 

Trajan crossed the Danube at two places 
without molestation. At first it seemed as if 
the Dacians were going to give in without a 
struggle. An embassy arrived to beg for 
peace, offering surrender without conditions. 
But this was a palpable imposture. The envoys 






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THE LAST ADVANCE 341 

were men of low rank — so much Trajan knew 
from the habits of the country — for they were 
bareheaded. The next envoys were certainly 
nobles, but they had no real authority to treat. 
The Dacian king, Decebalus by name, was 
simply trying to gain time. Not long after he 
fell upon the legions as they marched. A fierce 
battle followed, in which the Dacians were 
defeated, but at a heavy cost. The Romans 
still advanced ; when they were near his chief 
stronghold, Decebalus again gave battle. This 
time he was beaten even more decisively than 
before. For the time his spirit was broken. 
The envoys whom he now sent were nobles of 
the highest rank, who came into Trajan's 
presence with their hands bound behind their 
backs in token of absolute submission. Dece- 
balus himself consented to pay his homage to 
Trajan in person, and to send deputies to Rome 
to arrange conditions of peace. This was in 
102 A.D, 

Scarcely had Trajan turned his back — his 
presence being much wanted at Rome — when 
the Dacians were in arms again. Decebalus's 
own hereditary kingdom lay far to the east, in 
what is now called Transylvania, but nothing 
could stop the march of the Roman legions. 
They made their way over river and mountain, 



342 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

and stormed stronghold after stronghold. At 
last Decebalus, in despair, put an end to his 
own life. The new province of Dacia was 
thoroughly organised, for Trajan was as great 
an administrator as a soldier. To this day the 
remains of the great works which his engineers 
and architects raised at his bidding remain to 
testify to the completeness with which the work 
was done. For more than a century and a half 
it remained one of the most orderly and civi- 
lised of the Roman provinces. It was not till 
275 a.d. that Aurelian withdrew the legions to 
the southern bank of the Danube. 

During the time of the Good Emperor 1 Rome 
kept her dominions unimpaired. Even under 
their weaker successors, though decay was at 
work within, her power for awhile was not 
visibly shaken. It was with the appearance 
of the Goths upon the scene that the end 
began. 

1 It began with Nerva in 96 a.d. and ended with the 
death of Marcus Aurelius in 1 80. 



BOOK VI 

ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 
THE DECLINE 



I. A CENTURY OF DISGRACE 

ONE of the strangest facts in history is the 
rapid decline of Roman power that set in 
immediately after the Empire had enjoyed such 
a succession of good rulers as had never before 
fallen to its lot. The period of eighty-four years 
which began with the accession of Nerva and 
ended with the death of Marcus Aurelius has 
always been regarded, and rightly regarded, as 
the golden age of Rome. Trajan was, it is true, 
a warlike Emperor by choice, and Marcus 
Aurelius the same by necessity, but Rome 
had never had since its founding any but the 
briefest intervals of peace. War, in short, was 
its natural condition, and it had seldom been 

carried on with more success than it was by 

343 



344 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

Trajan in Dacia and by Aurelius against the 
Quadi and the Marcomanni. On the other 
hand, the reigns of Hadrian and Antoninus Pius 
(117-161) made up together forty-four years, 
considerably more than what is usually reckoned 
as a generation, of almost unbroken peace. Yet 
the good effects of nearly a century of wise rule 
seemed to vanish almost immediately when the 
last of the " Good Emperors " passed away. It 
is true that Aurelius had a deplorably weak 
and vicious successor. 1 But Commodus was 
not more contemptible than Caligula, Nero, or 
Domitian, and Rome had survived their rule 
without much apparent injury. Some writers 
have found a cause in a succession of plagues 
which raged throughout the Empire with an 
almost unexampled severity, and it is true that 
the century which followed the year 165 2 was 
terribly distinguished by this visitation, but no 
external calamities are sufficient to account 

1 It is remarkable that the most philosophic of the 
"Good Emperors" departed from the rule of adoption 
which had apparently been so beneficial to Rome, and 
left the succession to his son, of whose real character he 
could hardly have been ignorant. Gibbon, however, thinks 
that the want of the hereditary principle was one of the 
great causes of the troubles of the Empire. 

2 In 165 the legions returning from the East are said to 
have brought the Oriental plague into Europe. 






A CENTURY OF DISGRACE 345 

for a nation's decay. These causes are to be 
sought elsewhere, within rather than without, 
in the life of men more than in the calamities 
which years of famine or of pestilence inflict 
upon them. And it is clearly beyond my 
province to do more than indicate them in 
the very briefest way. We see signs of what 
was going on in days when to all appearance 
the Empire was most flourishing, while it was 
certainly still pursuing its career of conquest. 
Virgil writes a great poem to commend the 
honest healthy toil of a country life to a 
generation which had ceased to care for it. 
The cities were more and more crowded, for 
the luxuries which they put within the reach of 
even the poorest were more and more sought 
after, but the country was passing into a desert 
or a pleasure ground. The farmers or peasants 
who had formed the backbone of Roman armies 
had ceased to be ; their fields, where they had 
not gone out of cultivation, were tilled by huge 
gangs of slaves. Provincial towns which in 
old days had been strong enough to make 
treaties on equal terms with Rome were now 
half in ruins, with a scanty population that 
barely contrived to exist. With every year 
things grew worse and worse. And the Em- 
pire aggravated the evils which at first it had 



346 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

done much to palliate if not to remedy. It 
had superseded the Republic, because this 
had become utterly corrupt ; but in time it 
became as corrupt itself, and for the corrup- 
tion of a despotism there is no cure. A 
succession of able rulers put off the end for 
a time, but it had to come. And when it came 
there came with it more vigorous races out ot 
whom was to be formed by degrees, not without 
help of the old order which they swept away, 
a new civilisation. 

Commodus, the unworthy son and successor 
of the good Aurelius, reigned but for a short 
time. He was assassinated in his thirty-second 
year. With his death began, it may be said, the 
rule of the sword. His successor, indeed, Perti- 
nax by name, was chosen by the Senate, and well 
deserved his election, but he reigned for some- 
thing less than ninety days, and the Praetorians, 
the soldiers of the capital, murdered him and 
sold the throne openly to the highest bidder. 
To this arrogance the legions in the provinces 
refused to submit. The principal armies put up 
candidates of their own. We need not follow the 
succession of these short-lived rulers. It will 
suffice to say that in the hundred and five years 
which intervened between the death of Aurelius 
and the accession of Diocletian (180-285) there 



A CENTURY OF DISGRACE 347 

were no less than twenty Emperors, not to 
mention innumerable Pretenders — it was said 
that at one time thirty * claimed the throne. 
For a time the spectacle of the Roman armies 
engaged in almost incessant struggles with each 
other does not seem to have produced the effect 
which might have been expected on the tribes 
outside the frontiers of the Empire. No move- 
ment of any importance among the barbarians 
is recorded during the fifty years which followed 
the murder of Pertinax by the Praetorians. 
In 209, indeed, the Britons of the north 
attacked the Roman province, and were 
punished, without any lasting effect, by Sep- 
timius Severus. But the event was of no 
particular importance, for the North Britons 
were not powerful enough, even if they had 
succeeded, to seriously affect the course of 
events. Causes with which we are not exactly 
acquainted kept the far more formidable tribes 
of Germany inactive. We hear of a combina- 
tion among them in the reign of Aurelius which 
might well have become dangerous, if, to use 
the language of Gibbon, it included all the 
nations from the mouth of the Rhine to the 
mouth of the Danube. But it came to nothing. 
The tribes which first took the field were 
? Gibbon reduces the number to nineteen. 



348 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

defeated. Discouragement and dissension kept 
the others inactive. Dissension, indeed, was 
the most potent influence which worked in 
favour of the Romans. In his remarkable 
treatise on Germany and its tribes Tacitus 
gives a description of the people which em- 
phasises their superiority in many important 
respects to the degenerate sons of Rome. But 
he speaks with satisfaction of the internal strife 
which prevented them from becoming formid- 
able, mentioning one great conflict in which 
one tribe had been wholly destroyed by its 
neighbours, and adds, " While the destinies of 
Empire hurry us on, fortune can give us no 
greater boon than discord among our foes." 

But this state of things naturally would not 
last. It would cease when some chief of com- 
manding ability and strong personal influence 
should come to the front, or when some tribe 
should become so powerful as to attract or 
compel its neighbours to unite with it. Such a 
tribe came upon the scene later on in the first 
half of the third century of our era. The Gothi, 
to use the most common of the various forms 
of their name, are first mentioned many 
centuries before the time of which I am now 
speaking. Pytheas, of Marseilles, who travelled 
in Northern Europe about the time of Alexan- 



A CENTURY OF DISGRACE 349 

der the Great, speaks of them as inhabiting the 
coasts of the Baltic, and Tacitus, writing about 
90 a.d., locates them in much the same district. 
A hundred years or so after this date, however, 
they are spoken of as dwelling near the Black 
Sea. We need not trouble ourselves, however, 
with their place of abode, nor yet with the 
question of their race. Some writers hold that 
they were of the Slavonic family, not the 
Teutonic. That there were some Slavs in the 
great multitude which the Romans knew by 
the common name of Goths is more than 
probable. In just the same way there was a 
Celtic element in the great Teutonic swarm 
which had so nearly overrun Italy at the close 
of the second century B.C. But all that we 
know about them, whether as regards their 
habits or their appearance, would lead us to 
think that they were Germans. 

Some time, therefore, about 247 a.d., the 
Goths invaded and overran the province of 
Dacia. Crossing the Danube into Msesia l 
(Bulgaria) they besieged its capital town, now 
known by the name of Pravadi (twenty-five 
miles to the west of Varna). The town was 
ill-protected, for with the whole province of 
Dacia between it and the frontier of the Empire 
1 The Eastern division of the province. 



35o ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

it anticipated no danger. The inhabitants saw 
nothing better to do than to buy off the enemy 
by the payment of a large ransom. Such a 
policy is seldom successful, as we know from 
the history of our own island, where the plan of 
buying off the Danes was tried again and again 
to very little purpose. The Goths departed, 
and before long came back again. 

Decius, who had by this time supplanted 
Philip the Arabian on the imperial throne, on 
receiving the news of this second invasion, 
marched to the relief of the provinces attacked. 
He found the barbarians besieging Nicopoli 
(on the southern bank of the Danube). On 
his approach they promptly raised the siege, 
marched across Msesia and made their way 
over the Balkans with the intention of attack- 
ing Philippopolis. Decius followed them, 
without apparently taking due precautions 
against surprise, for the Goths turned upon 
him, and routed his army. His forces were so 
shattered that he could not attempt to help 
Philippopolis, which not very long afterwards 
was taken by storm and sacked. 

Decius, though he had made a disastrous 
mistake, was a brave and capable soldier. He 
took prompt measures to retrieve his defeat, 
guarding the places where the Danube could be 



A CENTURY OF DISGRACE 351 

crossed and the Balkan passes so as to pre- 
vent reinforcements from reaching the Goths. 
These, on their part, had suffered severely. 
The siege and storms had cost them many- 
lives ; their supplies were running short, for 
they carried no stores with them, and could 
draw but little sustenance from a country which 
they had wasted. And they were much 
alarmed at the prospect of having their 
retreat cut off. Under these circumstances 
they offered to surrender all their booty and 
all their prisoners, if they were permitted to 
return unharmed to their own country. Decius 
refused to accept the offer. He probably 
thought, and had some reason for thinking, 
that no agreement could be profitably made 
with barbarians. The only way to deal with 
the Goths was to deal with them as Marius had 
dealt with the Cimbri and Teutones. The 
invaders prepared to fight. The battle that 
followed was obstinately contested. The Goths 
were drawn up in three lines — we may observe 
from the first indications of a certain military 
skill and training in the tribe — the third of 
which was protected by a morass. The first 
and the second of these were broken ; the third 
stood firm, and repulsed all the attacks of the 
legions. The Emperor's son had fallen early 



352 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

in the day ; of the fate of Decius himself noth- 
ing was ever known. What is certain is that 
the army was almost annihilated. The Goths 
were able to make their way home without 
losing their spoil or their prisoners. They even 
received a great sum for promising not to 
molest again the provinces of Rome, till, of 
course — for such must have been the proviso 
understood on both sides — they should find it 
convenient to do so. This battle lacks a name, 
for the place where it was fought cannot be 
identified, but it was an event of the greatest 
importance. Rome had suffered worse disasters 
before, but never one that entailed so great a 
loss of credit. A barbarian army destroys a 
provincial capital, defeats two armies, slays the 
Emperor himself, and returns home, not only 
with all its booty, but with a heavy bribe with 
which its forbearance had been purchased. 
Clearly this was the beginning of the end. 

For some years after their campaigns in the 
region of the Danube, the Goths occupied 
themselves with expeditions which bear a 
curious resemblance to those made by their 
kinsmen of later times, the Vikings and North- 
men. They do not seem to have had any 
seamanship of their own, but they lured or 
compelled the maritime population of the 



A CENTURY OF DISGRACE 353 

Black Sea coast-line to assist them. Their 
first voyage was eastward. They sailed along 
the northern coast of the Black Sea, taking 
Pitsunda on their way, rounded the eastern 
end, and finally captured Trebizond, the 
wealthiest city in northern Asia Minor, where 
they possessed themselves of a vast quantity 
of spoil and a multitude of prisoners. Their 
next voyage had a westerly direction. They 
overran the province of Bithynia. The famous 
towns of Nicala and Nicomedia, among others, 
fell into their hands, almost without any attempt 
at resistance. It was more than three centuries 
since these regions had known the presence of 
a foreign enemy. They had no troops of their 
own, except, possibly, some local levies which 
certainly had had no experience of warfare, and 
the legions which should have defended them 
had sadly degenerated both in courage and in 
discipline. The third expedition of the Goths 
took them outside the Black Sea into the 
^Egean. Their fleet sailed into the Piraeus. 
Athens, which had not attempted, possibly 
had not been permitted, to repair its walls, 
demolished more than three hundred years 
before by Sulla, was taken and plundered. 
Greece could offer no resistance. It had 
neither means nor men. The invaders still 

24 



354 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

advanced westwards, and threatened Italy 
itself. Here, however, their progress was 
stayed. But from this expedition also, auda- 
cious as it was, they returned in safety. It 
gave another proof, not less significant than 
the death of Decius, how low the Empire 
had already fallen. 

While the Goths were evading the south- 
eastern provinces of the Empire, other enemies 
were busy in the north and west. The Franks 
now make their first appearance in history. 
The name which meets us frequently in the 
modern world, notably in France, and in such 
terms as Franconia, Frankfort, Frankenthal, 
means the " free," and probably originated in a 
combination of the tribes who inhabited the 
eastern bank of the Rhine, and who assumed 
this title by way of distinguishing themselves 
from the subjects of Rome on the opposite side of 
the river. The Franks laid waste the province of 
Gaul, crossed the Pyrenees and desolated Spain. 
We know very little of the details of their in- 
vasion. One of the so-called " Thirty Tyrants," 
Postumus by name, is said to have checked their 
progress, and done something to protect the 
Roman provinces of the West. Postumus was 
slain in 267 a.d. 

This date belongs to the period of extreme 



A CENTURY OF DISGRACE 355 

depression which coincides with the reigns of 
Valerian and Gallienus. Valerian was a 
favourite lieutenant of the Emperor Decius, 
and seems to have been a man of high character 
and ability. But circumstances were too strong 
for him. Great as were the dangers that 
threatened the European provinces of the 
Empire, it was on the Asiatic frontier that he 
found his presence more imperatively demanded. 
A revolution in Parthia had restored the ancient 
dynasty of the Persian kings, or, at least, a 
family that claimed that character. The new 
line of kings was now represented by a certain 
Shapar, or, as the Romans spelt it, Sapor. 
Armenia, long a bone of contention between 
Rome and Parthia, was overrun ; the garrisons 
on the Euphrates were forced to surrender. 
Valerian hastened to meet the new enemy, 
encountered him near Edessa, and suffered a 
crushing defeat. We know next to nothing 
of what happened except that the legions were 
led, by the folly of their chief or the treachery 
of those whom he trusted, into a hopeless situa- 
tion ; that their attempt to cut their way through 
the hosts of the enemy was repulsed with great 
loss; and that in the end Valerian had to sur- 
render himself to Sapor, and that the legions 
laid down their arms. There was nothing now 



356 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

to stop the Parthian king. The splendid city 
of Antioch was taken and plundered or burnt. 
He even crossed the Taurus range, and captured 
the wealthy city of Tarsus. It is impossible to 
say where he would have stopped, had it not 
been for the courage and ability of Odenatus, 
the governor of Palmyra and his wife Zenobia. 
It was they, not the Roman arms that com- 
pelled the Parthians to make their way back to 
their own country, 

Valerian was never released from captivity. 
Stories — whether true or no it is impossible to 
say — were told of the humiliations to which he 
was subjected by the Persian king. Whenever 
Sapor mounted his horse, he used to put his 
foot on the neck of his captive. And when the 
unhappy man was released by death, his skin 
was stuffed with straw, and the figure preserved 
in one of the Persian temples, "a more real 
monument of triumph," remarks Gibbon, " than 
the fancied trophies of brass and marble so often 
erected by Roman vanity." Whatever may be 
the truth about this or that fact, it is certain 
that this period witnessed the infliction of two 
unprecedented humiliations on the dignity of 
Rome, one Emperor slain in battle, another 
kept in a dishonourable captivity. 



II 

A CENTURY OF REVIVAL 

AN observer of the calamities and disgraces 
which overtook the Empire in what I have 
called " A Century of Disgrace," might have 
supposed that the end was at hand. But an 
ancient institution does not perish so easily. 
The Empire still possessed a great prestige, an 
organisation of government which had been 
worked out by a succession of able statesmen 
and rulers, and an army with numberless tradi- 
tions of victory. Given an able leader, there 
would certainly be a revival of vigour, or, to say 
the least, a check to the progress of decay. A 
better time began with the death of Gallienus, 
the son of Valerian, in a.d. 268. He perished, 
it is doubtful whether by treachery or accident, 
in one of the numberless conflicts that occurred 
during this period between the possessor of 
the imperial throne and the numerous pretenders 
who aspired to it. His successor was a soldier 

357 



358 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

of humble origin, though he bore the old 
patrician name of Claudius. He had soon an 
opportunity of showing his qualities as a soldier. 
In the year after his accession to the throne a 
huge army of Goths and of other tribes who 
were accustomed to fight under their standard 
invaded the provinces south of the Danube. 
Claudius hastened to encounter them, and fought 
a great battle at Nissa in Servia in which 
50,000 of the barbarians are said to have 
perished. Little is known of the details of this 
or indeed of any of the conflicts of the time; 
the chronicles of the age are wanting in the 
power of description and, indeed, in all literary 
gift, but we gather that the legions were 
beginning to give way when Claudius brought 
up reinforcements to their help. These fresh 
troops fell upon the barbarian rear, and wholly 
changed the fortunes of the day. But the 
victory of Nissa did not put an end to the war. 
Nor, indeed, did Claudius live to finish it. He 
did enough, it is true, to win the title of Gothicus, 
and to deserve it better than was sometimes 
the case with Emperors who were similarly 
honoured. 1 But he died — the victim, it was 

1 Domitian, for instance, was styled Germanicus, though 
his campaigns against the Germans were marked by disaster 
rather than by victory. 



A CENTURY OF REVIVAL 359 

said, of a plague which had originated in the 
barbarian camp — after a reign of little more 
than two years, and left the completion of the 
war to his successor Aurelian. 

Aurelian's reign was but little longer than 
that of Claudius. It began in August, 270, 
and was ended in March, 275, by assassination ; 
but this brief period was crowded with great 
achievements. In dealing with the Goths he 
showed that he was a statesman as well as a 
soldier. After conclusively proving to them 
that he could vanquish them in the field, he 
turned them, by a seasonable generosity, from 
enemies into friends. It had become evident 
that the province which Trajan had added to 
the Empire could no longer be held with advan- 
tage ; Dacia, accordingly, was given up to the 
Goths, and a tribe associated with them, of 
whom we shall hear again, the Vandals. The 
Goths remained loyal to Rome, till, as we shall 
see, they were forced into hostility. They even 
furnished a body of auxiliary cavalry to the 
imperial army. 

But while Aurelian was thus engaged, Italy 
and even Rome were endangered by the attack 
of another multitude of the same German race. 
The Alemanni, a people of which we know next 
to nothing except the stock to which they be- 



360 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

longed, 1 suddenly crossed the Roman frontier, 
and made their way as far as the north of Italy. 
The armies of the Empire were engaged else- 
where, and the invaders plundered the country 
without hindrance. They had even made their 
way back to the Danube when Aurelian en- 
countered them. It is not easy to understand 
the story of what followed. The Emperor 
outmanoeuvres the barbarians, and reduces them 
to such extremities that they beg for peace. 
When their envoys are introduced to the 
presence of Aurelian, there is a sudden change 
of circumstances. The Alemanni, instead of 
imploring pardon, dictate conditions. They 
must have a subsidy, if Rome would have them 
as allies. The Emperor dismisses them with 
an indignant refusal, and we expect to hear of 
the severest punishment being inflicted on them. 
Nothing of the kind occurs. Aurelian, called 
elsewhere by some demand which he cannot 
refuse, disappears from the scene, and leaves 
the completion of the business to his lieutenants. 
They neglect their duty or fail to perform 
it ; the Alemanni take the opportunity, break 
through the cordon of troops which had been 
formed round them, and make their way back 

1 The historians of the time do not give them the same 
name. 



A CENTURY OF REVIVAL 361 

to Italy. We next hear of them as ravaging 
the territory of Milan. Aurelian orders the 
legions to follow them with all the speed that 
they could manage, and hastens himself to 
defend Italy with a quickly moving force, 
partly composed, it is interesting to observe, of 
auxiliary cavalry levied from the new settlers in 
Dacia. The struggle that followed is not what 
we should have expected after hearing of the 
straits to which the Alemanni had been reduced 
at the Danube. At Piacenza the Roman army 
came perilously near to destruction. The 
barbarians fall unexpectedly upon the legions 
as they march carelessly through a wooded 
defile. Only by the greatest exertions does 
Aurelian rally them. But though the army 
is saved from destruction, it cannot arrest the 
progress of the enemy. When we next hear 
of them the barbarians have advanced more 
than a hundred miles nearer to Rome. Near 
the Metaurus, and not far from the spot where 
Hasdrubal had perished, the Emperor over- 
took them. This time they must have suffered 
a serious defeat, for their third and last appear- 
ance in Northern Italy, near Pavia (the ancient 
Ticimirn). Historians relate that they were 
exterminated, and this is probably true, for it 
was the fate that would naturally overtake 
unsuccessful invaders of Italy. 



362 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

I may mention in the very briefest way that 
Aurelian restored the Roman power in the East 
by overthrowing Zenobia, who, since the death 
of her husband Odenathus, had remained inde- 
pendent at Palmyra, and in the West by putting 
an end to the usurpation of Tetricus, who 
had maintained his independence in Gaul and 
Britain for several years. To all appearance, 
the Empire was restored to what it had been 
at the death of Marcus Aurelius. 



Ill 



THREE DEADLY BLOWS 



TO tell the story of the last century of the 
Roman Empire in any fullness of detail 
would be impossible in any space that I can 
command. I must limit myself to a narrative 
of what may truly be called the three most 
significant incidents in that period. 

The first of the fatal blows which may be 
said to have brought the Empire of Rome to 
an end was dealt almost against the will of 
those from whom it came. The policy of 
Aurelian in ceding Dacia to the Goths had 
been, on the whole, successful. They had 
been contented and even friendly, finding 
sufficient employment for their arms in ex- 
tending their power among their barbarous 
neighbours, and furnishing not a few recruits 
to the imperial armies. In 375 they were 

disturbed by reports of an invading host which 

363 



364 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

was advancing from the north and east. These 
reports pictured the new-comers as hideous 
in appearance and cruelly savage in character. 
We are now used to the Tartar countenance, 
but to Europe in the fourth century the broad, 
almost beardless face, flat nose, eyes set wide 
apart, and squat figure, were as frightful as 
they were strange. As for the savagery of the 
Huns — for so the new-comers were called — 
rumours were scarcely exaggerated. The 
Goths had themselves in former times been 
scarcely less ferocious in their manners, but 
they had now for several generations been in 
contact with civilisation, and the Christian faith 
had begun to find its way among them. Both 
divisions of the nation, known by the names 
of Ostrogoths and Visigoths, were successively 
defeated by the invading host, which showed 
military skill as well as courage. The Ostro- 
goths submitted, as a body, to the invaders, 
though a considerable minority contrived to 
escape, taking with them their infant king. 
The Visigoths resolved to throw themselves 
on the protection of Rome. They sent envoys 
to the Emperor (Valens), and begged that 
they might be permitted to cross the frontier. 
After some delay Valens gave his consent, and 
the whole nation — a few scattered companies 



THREE DEADLY BLOWS 365 

excepted — was transported across the Danube. 
The numbers of the refugees may be calculated 
at a million, as there were no less than two 
hundred thousand males of the military age. 
It had been stipulated that all weapons should 
be given up. But this condition was very 
generally evaded. The corrupt officials of the 
Empire were ready, for a consideration, to 
permit the Gothic warriors to keep their arms. 
Having thus allowed them to remain formid- 
able, they proceeded, with almost incredible 
folly, to insult and oppress them in every 
possible way. They robbed them of their 
wives and children, and sold at extortionate 
prices the food which the Imperial Govern- 
ment was bound to provide without cost. 
Meanwhile the generals of Valens neglected 
to maintain the defences of the Danube, and 
a large body of Ostrogoths who had been 
refused a passage over the river, took the 
matter into their own hands, and crossed over 
into the province. The two branches of the 
nation were not long in coming to an under- 
standing, and making common cause against 
their oppressors. It was not long before the 
smouldering fire burst into flame. The first 
battle took place not far from Pravadi, 1 where 
1 See p. 349. 



366 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

Claudius had defeated the Goths many years 
before. We know little about this conflict 
except its result, which, as the historian of the 
Goths (or, as he calls them, Getse) puts it, was 
to bring about a state of things in which the 
Goths were no longer strangers and foreigners, 
but members of the State and lords of the 
country which they occupied. An indecisive 
engagement followed at a spot called Salices 
("The Willows") in the low land near the 
mouth of the Danube, but the great battle of 
the war was fought at Hadrianople. Valens, 
who had spent a considerable time, with little 
profit to the Empire, at Antioch, returned in 
the early summer of 378 a.d. to Constantinople. 
After a brief rest in that city, where he made 
some changes in the chief commands of his 
army, he marched northwards and fortified a 
camp under the walls of Hadrianople. It was 
debated between the Emperor and his chief 
advisers whether or no they should fight at 
once. There were many reasons for delay. 
Valens occupied a strong position, and had 
the command of unlimited supplies. The 
barbarians, on the other hand, were ill-pro- 
vided in every respect, and would most 
certainly grow weaker the longer they were 
compelled to keep the field. Another power- 



THREE DEADLY BLOWS 367 

fill consideration was, or should have been, the 
approach of Gratian, Emperor of the West, 
to whom Valens had appealed for help, and 
who was now advancing eastward by forced 
marches. Gratian had, indeed, sent a special 
messenger imploring Valens not to risk a battle 
before his arrival. Unfortunately this request 
had an effect exactly opposed to what had been 
intended. Valens was anxious to secure for 
himself all the glory which would come from 
the victory which he confidently expected, and 
when Gratian begged for delay, he at once 
resolved to fight. 

It was the height of summer, and Valens 
was scarcely acting with judgment when he 
moved out of his position under the walls of 
Hadrianople, and commenced a march which 
could not be expected to be accomplished 
under four hours — the distance to be traversed 
was ten miles — with the intention of attacking 
the enemy. In any case the men would have 
been not a little wearied or exhausted ; as it 
was, one wing of the army considerably out- 
marched the other, and that which had lagged 
behind was forced to hurry that it might take 
its proper place in the line. Even after this 
time was wasted, for Valens was amused with 
proposals for a truce or cessation of arms which 



368 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

the enemy had no intention of acting on. One 
of the imperial generals, possibly impatient of 
the delay, made an attack which was easily 
repulsed. The Gothic cavalry, in reply, 
charged with fatal effect. The Roman horse- 
men fled before them, and the legions, left 
alone in an open plain to face an enemy 
superior in force, were practically destroyed. 
The fate of Valens is uncertain ; but the more 
generally received account was that, having 
been severely wounded, he was carried off 
the field to a cottage in the neighbourhood. 
Before any way of escape could be discovered, 
before even his wound could be dressed, the 
cottage was surrounded by the enemy. The 
inmates did their best to defend it, and the 
Goths, impatient of delay, set fire to it and 
burnt it to the ground. Valens, anyhow, was 
never seen again. The army of Rome was 
swept from the earth at Hadrianople as com- 
pletely as it had been at Cannae, but Rome 
had lost in the five centuries that separated 
these two great disasters her power of re- 
covery. 

The next great blow received by Rome 
came also from Gothic hands. The first 
mention of Alaric shows us a significant 
change in Roman policy. The Gothic chief 



THREE DEADLY BLOWS 369 

holds a high command in the armies of the 
Empire, and was employed by the ruler in 
possession in his struggle against a pretender. 
When he turned against his employer it was 
because he was disappointed in his ambition 
of filling a yet higher post. There is no need 
to describe his career at length. A brief out- 
line shows plainly enough, not only his genius, 
for he was certainly a statesman and a soldier 
of great ability, but the deplorable weakness 
of the Empire. At first, indeed, he had an 
antagonist who was more than his match. In 
396 he openly revolted, and marched into 
Greece, which he plundered without meeting 
with any resistance, for the country had long 
since passed into a condition of helpless servi- 
tude. But he was pursued by Stilicho, himself 
a barbarian by birth — a soldier who was equal 
to any of the great commanders of the past. 
The Goths found themselves shut up in the 
Peloponnesus. Their leader, however, con- 
trived to extricate himself from his difficul- 
ties, transporting his army across the western 
end of the Gulf of Corinth, and occupying 
Epirus. The next thing in his extraordi- 
nary career was that he was appointed by 
the Emperor of the East — the Eastern and 
Western Empires had been finally severed 

25 



370 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

four years before ] — to be the Governor of 
the province of Illyricum. Here he was 
able to plan and prepare his schemes for 
the final conquest of Rome. That the oppor- 
tunity for so doing should have been given 
by the power that should have been Rome's 
closest ally was a sure sign of the approaching 
ruin. 

A few years after his establishment in 
Illyricum, Alaric, who had been in the mean- 
time saluted king by his countrymen, felt 
himself equal to the task of invading Italy. 
Stilicho, however, was still in command of the 
Roman armies — now almost wholly recruited 
from barbarian tribes — and he proved himself 
more than a match for the Gothic king. The 
great battle of Pollentia (in Northern Italy) 
was contested with more than usual stubborn- 
ness. Fortune changed sides more than once. 
Stilicho's genius prevailed, however, in the 
end ; the Goths were driven from the field ; 
their camp was taken, and Alaric's wife fell 
into the hands of the conquerors. But the 
great leader was not yet beaten. His cavalry, 
the principal strength of his forces, had not 

1 When the Emperor Theodosius died (394 a.d.) his 
two sons Honorius and Arcadius became emperors of the 
West and East respectively. 



THREE DEADLY BLOWS 371 

been broken, and he formed the bold scheme 
of marching upon Rome. This, however, was 
given up ; he accepted, in preference, the offer 
of Stilicho, who proposed to allow him to 
depart unharmed from Italy, on condition of 
his becoming for the future an ally of Rome. 
He did not, however, intend to perform his 
part of the bargain. On the contrary, he 
formed a scheme for possessing himself of 
Gaul. But his plans were betrayed to Stilicho, 
and he suffered another defeat in the neigh- 
bourhood of Verona which was not less dis- 
astrous than that of Pollentia. Even then, 
however, he was a formidable enemy, and 
Stilicho allowed him to retire from Italy, 
rather than drive him to extremities, 

After four years, years of incessant drain 
upon the resources of the Empire, Alaric pre- 
pared to renew his attempt on Rome. Stilicho 
was dead. Possibly he had deserved his fate, 
for he had certainly cherished ambitions which 
did not become a loyal subject. But there 
was no one to take his place at the head of 
the legions. Certainly Alaric met with no 
opposition as he marched through Italy, finally 
pitching his camp under the walls of Rome. 
Resistance was impossible ; it only remained 
to see what was the smallest price at which 



372 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

the enemy could be bought off. Two envoys 
from the Senate approached the king. They 
began by counselling prudence. It would be 
well, they said, if Alaric did not drive a brave 
and numerous people to despair. "The thicker 
the hay, the easier to mow," was the king's 
answer. When asked to name the ransom 
which he was willing to accept, he declared 
that he must have all the gold and silver that 
they possessed, all their valuables, and all the 
slaves of barbarian birth. " What then do 
you leave us ? " was the question which the 
envoys in their consternation put to him. 
" Your lives," he answered. In the end, 
however, he consented to a compromise, by 
which he was to receive five thousand pounds 
of gold, thirty thousand pounds of silver, and 
a quantity of precious articles, silk, cloth, and 
spices. 

The respite thus purchased was but brief. 
The ministers of the Emperor, safe themselves 
in the fortress of Ravenna, behaved with a 
strange mixture of weakness and treachery. 
Their crowning act of folly was to permit a 
barbarian chief in their pay to make an un- 
provoked attack on a detachment of Goths. 
This was indeed destroyed, but the victory 
was dearly purchased. Alaric, justly indignant 



THREE DEADLY BLOWS $73 

at such behaviour, broke off all negotiations, 
and marched on Rome. The Senate prepared 
to make all the resistance possible. But 
nothing was really done. Some traitors within 
the city opened one of the gates, and the 
Goths made their way into the city, which 
was given over to slaughter and plunder for 
six days. Rome may be said to have thus 
lost for ever her claim to rule the world. 
But her cup of humiliation was not yet full.. 

Alaric did not long survive the conquest 
of Rome. He died in the same year, and 
was buried — so, indeed, the story runs — in the 
channel of a stream whose waters had been 
diverted for the time, the labourers who per- 
formed the work being slaughtered to keep 
the secret of his resting-place from being ever 
divulged. 

But Rome was to fall into the power of a 
conqueror yet more powerful and more fero- 
cious. Attila was a Hun, and is said to have 
even exaggerated in his personal appearance 
all the characteristic deformities of his race. 
The boundaries of the Empire can hardly be 
defined, but it is certain that it was of enor- 
mous extent. It is scarcely an exaggeration 
to say that it reached from China to the Rhine. 
The hosts that followed him were almost 



374 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

beyond counting. For once the incredible 
numbers in which the historians of antiquity 
delight were no exaggeration. It is probably 
a modest estimate of his host to say that it 
consisted of half a million combatants. 

Powerful as he was, the king of the Huns 
was not permitted to pursue his course without 
opposition. Rome could still produce or rather 
adopt great soldiers — Aetius, the great antago- 
nist of Attila, was a Scythian by birth as 
Stilicho was a Vandal — and great soldiers can 
always find men to follow them. In the earlier 
part of Attila's reign, 1 his operations were 
carried on within the limits of the Eastern 
Empire. In 450 he attacked the West, one 
of his pretexts being the refusal of the Emperor 
Valentinian III. of his proposals for the hand 
of the Princess Honoria. He crossed the 
Rhine with a huge army at Strasburg, and 
marched on Orleans. But Aetius was pre- 
pared for him. A great battle was fought at 
Chalons-sur-Marne, the last successful effort of 
the Roman arms. One of the notable features 
of the battle is the division of the Goths, the 
Ostrogoths following the standard of Attila, 

1 He succeeded to the throne in 434 in partnership with 
his brother, and by this brother's death, or murder, as some 
said, became the ruler of the nation in 445. 



THREE DEADLY BLOWS 375 

while the Visigoths fought for Rome. The 
loss of men amounted to between two and 
three hundred thousand, but it was not un- 
equally divided. Aetius could not prevent 
the retreat of Attila, who retired into Eastern 
Europe, where he spent some months in 
recruiting his army. 

Early in the following year he crossed the 
Alps, descended into Italy, and after capturing 
and totally destroying the city of Aquileia, 
marched Romewards. He never reached the 
city, indeed. Not far from Mantua he was met 
by three ambassadors, one of them the bishop 
of Rome known as Leo the Great. They 
brought the offer of a complete submission. 
The Emperor no longer refused the condition 
which he had before peremptorily rejected. 
The Hunnish king was to have the hand of 
the Princess Honoria, and with her, as Gibbon 
epigrammatically puts it, "an immense ransom 
or dowry." The marriage never took place, 
for Attila died in the following year, but 
he had inflicted on Rome a humiliation even 
greater than that which she had suffered at 
the hand of Alaric. 

One more event I must record, because in 
a way it completes this great period of history. 
In 475 a youth who bore the name of Romulus 



376 ROME AND THE BARBARIANS 

and the nickname of Augustulus was raised 
to the throne by his father Orestes, who 
secured for a time control of such armies as 
still obeyed the Empire. In the following 
year Orestes was defeated and slain, and his 
son permitted to abdicate. Italy passed into 
the hands of Odoacer, king of the Heruli. 
The Old World had passed away and the 
New had begun. 



E P I LO G U E 

I TAKE it for granted that none of my 
readers doubt the existence of a definite 
purpose — some may prefer to call it a tendency 
— in human history. Writers on this subject 
have often been accused of dwelling too much 
on war. But war is the ultimate expression of 
human will, and war, with all its horrors and 
losses, has worked, we are glad to believe, for 
the general good. The fittest among the 
nations have survived. We cannot estimate 
the loss which mankind would have suffered 
if the great military monarchies of the East 
had crushed out of existence the insignificant 
tribe which was to be the world's teacher in 
righteousness. Something of the same kind 
may be seen in what is called secular history. 
Greece struggled bravely, against what must 
have seemed almost hopeless odds, to preserve 
herself from Persian domination. If the eleven 
thousand " Men of Marathon" had been trodden 

377 



378 EPILOGUE 

under foot by the hosts of Persia, the Athens of 
the fifth century, with its free political life and 
unrivalled intellectual development, would not 
have existed. A sterile despotism, without 
literature or art, would have taken its place, 
and the world would have been incalculably 
the poorer for the exchange. 

What is true of the struggle between Greece 
and Persia is true also of the great conflict, 
lasting for more than two centuries, in which 
the Sicilian Greeks, with now and then a little 
help from the motherland, held their own 
against Carthage. Persia and Carthage, though 
differing much from each other, were equally 
hostile to the essential principles of Western 
civilisation. 

Little need be said as to the issue of the 
wars between Rome and Carthage. Rome, 
indeed, took up the cause for which Greece 
had contended. It is impossible to conceive 
a Carthaginian Empire exercising a world- 
wide sway with anything like the beneficial 
results for which the world has to thank the 
dominion of Rome. Carthaginian politics and 
morals, as far as we have any knowledge of 
them, seem to have been narrow and inhuman. 

When we come to the conquests of Alex- 
ander, we are not able, it must be confessed, 



EPILOGUE 379 

to see our way so plainly. We may perceive, 
however, in it the spread of Greek influence 
over Western Asia. That influence had already 
been at work. Greek colonies had been planted 
far to the east ; the Oriental nations had been 
much affected by Greek thought and manners. 
Alexander's brief career — it lasted but eleven 
years — did much to promote this Hellenizing 
process. 

The empire of the great conqueror fell to 
pieces at his death, but two Greek kingdoms, 
to speak only of his Eastern dominion, were 
built out of the ruins. It was in these king- 
doms that some of the earliest victories of 
Christianity were won. Given to the world 
by a Semitic tribe, our faith used largely for 
its spread Greek means, of which a common 
Greek language is the most obvious. 

We need not prove that it was for the lasting 
good of the world that Rome was not crushed 
by the Celtic invaders of 390 B.C. or the Teu- 
tonic swarm of 112 b.c. It is equally plain 
that the development of the human race was 
largely helped by the subsequent spread of the 
Empire, till it embraced all Europe west of the 
Rhine and south of the Danube, all Northern 
Africa, and Asia west of the Euphrates. It is 
enough to say that Roman law is a dominating 



380 EPILOGUE 

power in most of the codes of modern Europe, 
and an important element in all. 

Finally, we have the overthrow of the 
Roman Empire by barbarians from the north 
and east. This overthrow may seem at first 
to be "chaos come again." So doubtless 
many thought at the time. Yet out of the 
turmoil of the fourth and the fifth centuries 
there came a new order, the order which we 
see in the Europe of to-day. The subject 
lies outside my province. I can only indicate 
the fact. 



UXWIN BROTHERS, THE GRESHAM PRESS, WOKING AND LONDON 



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